Junior Designer

Role overview

BMW Group is seeking a Junior Designer in Santa Monica, California. This position contributes to Designworks projects for clients across a variety of industries, with an emphasis on inventive thinking, strong design execution, and collaboration across disciplines.

What you'll do

• Contribute to a broad mix of project deliverables for clients in different sectors, helping create work that reflects strong creativity and design quality.
• Take projects from early research and ideation through concept development, refinement, implementation, and coordination with development teams and vendors.
• Apply design judgment to moderately complex and highly complex assignments while using analysis and problem-solving to improve outcomes.
• Encourage experimentation by bringing in new approaches, modern technologies, and progressive methods that raise the ambition of studio work.
• Balance established design principles with new tools and techniques to help shape future-facing client experiences.
• Help build and improve internal workflows and toolchains that increase efficiency and scale as the studio expands across regions and industries.
• Create and evolve concepts for products, interfaces, and brand experiences, assessing ideas against aesthetics, usability, sustainability, materials, production feasibility, and client requirements.
• Turn research, sketches, and insights into polished design directions and presentations while working closely with cross-functional teams.
• Support strategic services such as contextual research, design strategy, and design identity while managing hours and maintaining internal documentation systems.

What you need

• A bachelor's degree in industrial design, transportation design, automotive design, or a similarly ambitious creative field.
• 1 to 2 years of design experience, or an equivalent background, supported by a portfolio that shows breadth, experimentation, and a willingness to challenge convention.
• Strong command of 2D and 3D design tools such as Alias, Maya, Blender, Cinema 4D, KeyShot, and Adobe Creative Suite, plus the ability to adapt quickly to new tools.
• Experience using Figma and cloud-based collaboration platforms, with comfort working in real-time and AI-assisted design environments.
• Excellent understanding of form, proportion, and materials, along with the ability to develop original and ambitious design concepts.
• A proactive mindset that continuously looks for better ways to think, create, and solve problems.
• Clear communication skills, with the ability to present creative ideas confidently in verbal, visual, and written form.
• Self-directed learning habits, including staying current on design technology, fabrication methods, and cultural trends.
• Strong enthusiasm for design, aesthetics, and ongoing creative exploration.
• A distinctive design perspective with the goal of helping shape the next generation of visual and experiential language.
• Working knowledge of AI-assisted design workflows and the ability to use generative tools as part of everyday creative practice.

Compensation and work arrangement

The expected salary range for this role is $68,151 to $88,195 per year. Compensation will be finalized based on education, experience, skills, and location. The role is based in Santa Monica, CA and requires regular attendance at a BMW office or facility, with remote work capability in a hybrid arrangement. This is a full-time exempt position at function level EL VI. Relocation assistance is not available.

Hiring and eligibility notes

Employment is contingent on successfully completing a background check, which may include education verification, prior employment verification, criminal history review, credit history check, and a pre-employment drug screen where allowed by law. BMW Shared Services, LLC will determine whether the results are acceptable.

BMW does not provide immigration sponsorship or other employer support for this role. Candidates must already be authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis now and in the future without needing sponsorship, including through visa programs such as H-1B, O-1, E-3, H-1B1, TN, F-1 OPT, F-1 STEM OPT, or F-1 CPT.

BMW Group is an equal opportunity employer and considers qualified applicants without regard to age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or veteran status.

Additional information

Posting start date: 6/5/26. The role reports to Matthew Potter, Director, Interaction Design, LA. It is based in Santa Monica, CA and carries an exempt classification. For further details, candidates may contact Diana Irwin at Diana.Irwin@bmwsharedservices.com.