Full-Time
Director Product Design & Development
Posted on 8/20/2026
Four Hands
201-500 employees
Designer and wholesaler of furniture
No salary listed
Austin, TX, USA
In Person
Domestic and international travel is expected.
Bachelor's, Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA)
 UI/UX & Design (1) |
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- A BA or BBA in Industrial Design, Merchandising, International Business, or a related field.
- At least 15 years of progressive experience in international product development and design leadership within the home furnishings industry.
- A demonstrated track record of building and leading creative teams that deliver commercially successful, design-forward products across multiple categories.
- Deep, hands-on knowledge of furniture construction across case goods, seating, upholstery, metal, outdoor, and lighting.
- Experience developing seasonal material libraries across indoor case goods, fabric and leather, outdoor performance materials, and lighting across multiple price levels and countries of origin.
- Experience owning a seasonal design program end to end, from creative brief through market delivery, across multiple categories simultaneously.
- Strong commercial instincts with the ability to maintain a design point of view within margin, assortment, and calendar constraints.
- Established industry relationships with designers, material suppliers, mills, tanneries, trade press, and manufacturing partners.
- Demonstrated external presence in the design industry through trade events, editorial, press, or design community leadership.
- Clear, confident communication across all levels of the organization and across cultures, languages, and time zones.
- Expected domestic and international travel.
- Partner with the Senior Vice President of Design to lead trend research and creative brief development.
- Build and evolve the seasonal material and finish library.
- Develop the seasonal color story with Category Leaders and align direction by launch.
- Build out established design houses season over season with core and design-forward updates.
- Partner with Marketing and the Merchant Team on brand storytelling, editorial content, and design-led campaigns.
- Partner with Sales leadership to build training content and collection context.
- Translate the annual creative brief into a complete seasonal design story across suites, capsules, item stories, and material, finish, and fabric libraries.
- Translate design direction at the suite and category level, guiding form language, material, finish, hardware, and sub-category coverage before development begins.
- Drive the creative roadmap so Product Development, Merchandising, and Marketing can build from the same foundation.
- Identify assortment white space and build plans to address new categories, emerging formats, materials, and functionalities.
- Enforce brand-right standards across every category through weekly design reviews with the Product Development team.
- Review and approve CAD and render files for final design intent, ensuring specifications and comments are resolved and actionable for international manufacturing teams.
- Partner with Sourcing, Merchandising, and Product Development Operations to own the yearly development calendar and protect key milestones.
- Align design decisions with commercial goals, assortment strategy, and seasonal line plans, and communicate changes to the Product Development team.
- Create the strategic direction for indoor case goods materials and finishes, including wood species, stone, ceramic, painted and specialty finishes, and hardware.
- Drive proprietary finish and material development that creates a competitive advantage.
- Create seasonal fabric and leather direction across categories.
- Build mill and tannery partnerships that provide access to differentiated colorways, textures, and materials.
- Drive proprietary leather and fabric development.
- Create outdoor material strategy across weather-exposed categories, including solution-dyed acrylics, performance weaves, powder-coated aluminum, teak, reclaimed and treated woods, all-weather wicker, and concrete composites.
- Drive outdoor finish development aligned with seasonal creative direction and performance standards for ultraviolet, moisture, and fade resistance.
- Evaluate and introduce new outdoor materials using performance data, sustainability credentials, commercial viability, and vendor-scale capability.
- Set material and finish direction for lighting across categories.
- Maintain lighting development quality through shade construction, socket and hardware specifications, finish durability, and design intent from concept through production.
- Own Four Hands' design language at a systems level by defining material, finish, form, and construction standards.
- Establish CAD standards, specification templates, and design-package requirements for consistent Product Development execution and manufacturing handoff.
- Create and maintain documentation systems covering design rationale, material development history, and vendor learnings.
- Apply authoritative furniture-construction knowledge to design, vendor, and development decisions.
- Apply value-engineering discipline at the direction-setting level so cost and manufacturability are addressed from the start.
- Build and maintain knowledge of the Four Hands vendor base, including construction, material, volume, quality, and design-intent capabilities.
- Ensure design intent is fully resolved and documented before reaching manufacturing partners.
- Maintain knowledge of international freight procedures, certifications, and country-of-origin considerations affecting material sourcing and production.
Four Hands designs and wholesales a wide range of furniture and décor to furniture retailers, interior designers, and other trade customers. Its offerings include living and dining furniture, art, outdoor items, and accessories, accessible to trade customers 24/7 through an online catalog of about 6,000 design-forward products. The company develops its own pieces through trend spotting, material selection, and innovative design techniques from its studios and international offices. It differentiates itself through its global manufacturing footprint, long history since 1996, consistent trade-focused service, and recognition in the industry, enabling it to support large chains as well as independent stores and designers. The overarching goal is to help people create spaces that feel like home, by expanding its product assortment and providing dependable, design-driven options to retailers and designers worldwide.
Company Size
201-500
Company Stage
N/A
Total Funding
N/A
Headquarters
Austin, Texas
Founded
1996
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Simplify's Take
What believers are saying
- July 2026 Las Vegas Market launch broadened Four Hands into games and cordless lighting.
- Four Hands added hospitality projects in 2026, including a fast-tracked New York-area hotel.
- Four Hands’ Austin logistics footprint supports scale; Dalfen said capacity rises 60% at Del Valle.
What critics are saying
- Four Hands’ Summer 2026 maximalist bet can miss if consumers snap back toward restraint.
- Wayfair, Arhaus, and RH crowd the same premium lifestyle-furnishings buyers in 2026.
- If hospitality adoption stalls, Four Hands remains exposed to retailer inventory swings and channel concentration.
What makes Four Hands unique
- Four Hands sold 500 Summer 2026 designs, spanning furniture, lighting, art, and games.
- Four Hands launched Hospitality in October 2025 with 1,000 tested, stock-ready commercial styles.
- Four Hands combines design-forward merchandising with real-time inventory visibility for retailers and designers.
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Benefits
Professional Development Budget
Company News
Four Hands launches 500 new pieces in Summer 2026 collection. The Austin-based furniture brand leans into the growing shift away from minimalism with weathered, coastal-inspired products. AUSTIN, Texas - Starting in fall 2025, consumer tastes began shifting away from minimalism toward maximalism and warm interiors. This has been consistently reflected over the past few months, from April's High Point Market, where lived-in furnishings reigned supreme, to the debut of collections like The Collected Home by Arhaus, which focused on heirloom-style pieces that look inherited. Now, Austin, Texas-based home furnishings and decor company Four Hands is the latest to join the trend with the debut of its Summer 2026 collection at the July Las Vegas Market. The collection, which includes more than 500 new designs, is centered on a modern coastal theme. Rather than standard nautical motifs like shells or anchors, the company said it is interpreting the theme through how the coast shapes materials over time. The assortment, which includes living room, dining room and bedroom furniture, lighting and artwork, centers on time-shaped materials, including rope, rattan, weathered oak, aged brass and hand-worked iron. Another unique material featured in the collection is Bark Paper, new to Four Hands. Made from tropical fig trees, Bark Paper is, according to the company, a Japanese-inspired material whose irregular, light-absorbing texture creates subtle depth and movement on pieces. Used as a top layer, it appears to be tree bark peeled back, further adding to the collection's deliberately aged aesthetic. Bark Paper is featured on several pieces in Four Hands' summer collection, including sideboards, cabinets, end tables and coffee tables. Other notable products are the Roan Desk crafted from aged smoked oak, with oil-rubbed bronze hardware, and the Borro Lounge Chair, whose contemporary, stainless-steel looped frame appears vintage. Also with the launch of its summer collection, Four Hands expanded into a new product category: games. As Design News Now Editor-in-Chief Rachel Fasciani recently reported, game rooms and accessories in homes are a rising trend, from game tables to storage to accessories. Four Hands launched the Vella Poker Table, Victor Game Table, Skee Ball, Vella Ping Pong Table and Brote Shuffleboard Table. Featured materials include smoked aluminum and smoked oak, imbuing the pieces with an aged aesthetic. As part of the summer collection, Four Hands also debuted its first range of cordless lighting. The six small-scale lamps are dimmable and rechargeable, made with materials including marble, travertine and fluted glass, giving them an antique quality. Rounding out its summer collection is the coordinating debut from Four Hands Art Studio of its Ornate Frames including its Italian-made Gilded Antique Gold Frame and Sofia Iron Frame, which features a matte patina. The frames are intended to complement artwork and give them a sense of age. Since officially launching at market this past weekend, Four Hands' Summer 2026 collection is live at FourHands.com and also available at retailers including Shoppe Amber Interiors, Lumens and Perigold.
Four Hands unveils 500+ new designs in summer collection. Four Hands, a global leader in lifestyle furnishings, unveils 500+ new designs in its Summer 2026 collection. At the heart of the collection is Modern Coastal, a theme less about shells and nautical motifs than about how the coast shapes materials over time. Reimagined through a global craft lens and drawing on Paris markets, the assortment centers on time-shaped materials like rope, rattan, weathered oak, aged brass, and hand-worked iron. Alongside these time-shaped materials, the collection introduces several firsts for the brand. Chief among them the debut of Bark Paper, a Japanese-inspired material whose irregular, light-absorbing texture creates subtle depth and movement on pieces like the Cambros Sideboard. The brand also expands its lighting portfolio with its first line of rechargeable Cordless Lighting, which offers portable convenience and functionality while remaining fully at home in a design-forward collection. The season further marks major category expansions, including Games, with new outdoor formats and elevated designs such as the Brote Shuffleboard and Skee Ball, and a broadened, hospitality-approved selection that opens new commercial design possibilities. Alongside the furniture launch, Four Hands Art Studio introduces a new series of Ornate Frames - statement pieces designed to perform alongside artwork, not simply border it. Made to complement both traditional and contemporary works, each frame is crafted with intention, from the Italian-made Gilded Antique Gold Frame to the matte-patina Sofia Iron Frame. All summer introductions are now available on FourHands.com for retailers and interior designers. Learn more about the Four Hands Trade Program and find local retail stores carrying Four Hands' products.
Checking in: how Four Hands arrived in Hospitality. Four Hands, a global leader in lifestyle home furnishings, has steadily expanded its design influence across the industry, from collaborations with tastemakers like Amber Lewis to a growing presence at High Point Market and the introduction of new product categories. Since 2022, the brand has partnered with Sharp to help amplify this momentum and strengthen its voice across leading design publications and industry conversations. This fall, its partnership supported a major next step: Four Hands' entrance into the hospitality space with a 1,000-style collection created and tested for hotels, restaurants, bars, offices, and more. With a clear vision for how the brand could introduce this new offering, Sharp collaborated with the Four Hands team to concept and shape the hospitality launch strategy. The Four Hands events team brought the core idea to life through an immersive Soho pop-up, transformed into the "Four Hands Hotel." Featuring a lobby, music room, dining room, bar, and guest suite - complete with contract-grade furnishings and playful details like room-service trays atop the centerpiece bed - the space served as the central setting for all hospitality launch activations and offered a fully realized expression of the brand's hospitality identity. To reach the most influential voices in commercial design, Four Hands partnered with Interior Design to host an exclusive dinner in the Four Hands Hotel for a curated group of leaders from the publication's Hospitality Giants list. Timed to coincide with BDNY, the dinner created an intimate forum to preview the collection and share the brand's perspective on its expansion into hospitality. Building on this momentum, the team hosted a VIP cocktail event on BDNY's opening day, bringing together media, designers, and industry partners for another look at the must-see pop-up. The Interior Design dinner brought together 25 leading architects and designers from notable firms such as Rockwell Group, Gensler, and Meyer Davis, and featured remarks from Four Hands CEO Matthew Briggs and Interior Design's Editor-in-Chief Cindy Allen. The BDNY-adjacent cocktail event continued the conversation, welcoming key media and designers into the immersive space. A final component of the launch was the Four Hands booth at BDNY, where the team held targeted appointments and connected with key editors across hospitality and design outlets to further introduce the brand's hospitality perspective. Across the show, Four Hands engaged with 18 editors from publications like Hospitality Design, Metropolis, Dwell, and others - laying the groundwork for continued storytelling around the brand's thoughtful and ambitious entry into the category. The hospitality launch led to several possible projects with various firms, including one NYC-area hotel that fast-tracked Four Hands into its design and will be opening its doors in 2026. The launch debuted in Interior Design's October issue and online, with additional coverage across Business of Home, LUXE Interiors + Design, Furniture Today, and more. As well as upcoming coverage in Hospitality Design and Metropolis.
Four Hands has grown rapidly in recent years, earning them recognition on the Inc. 5000 List of Fastest Growing Companies 15 times.
Four Hands, the leading global designer and wholesaler of lifestyle home furnishings, is partnering with Slip Robotics to increase efficiency in warehouse operations.