Fort West is looking for a contract designer to produce brand, digital, and campaign work. You'll report to our Design Director, and collaborate closely with the rest of our team across strategy, experience, and project management.
We're looking for a strong collaborator. Someone to think through problems with, push the work further, and share the effort of producing it. You'll bring your own judgment and ideas to the table rather than executing to spec.
The work will be varied, and that's one of the best parts of the role. In a given month you might extend a brand identity into new applications, design pages for a website build, develop assets for a multi-channel campaign, produce presentation and/or print collateral, or support a photo/video shoot—often across several client projects at once.
We're looking for a designer with at least 3 years of experience across brand, digital, and campaign design. If you collaborate openly, communicate well, and take real pride in finished work, we'd love to hear from you.
What you'll do:
- Produce brand, digital, and campaign work that meets the Fort West standard. This is the core of the role.
- Interpret creative direction intelligently, make the nuanced calls, and bring back work that advances the core idea.
- Extend existing identity systems into new applications. Build asset libraries, production files, templates, and collateral that keep those systems usable and consistent in practice.
- Design pages, landing pages, and components within established systems in Figma, with clean, organized files ready for developer handoff.
- Adapt campaign concepts across social, paid media, email, presentations, and print while holding the integrity of the idea.
- Work to the estimated hours you're given, and tell us early if a project looks like it needs more time.
- Deliver on the timelines you've committed to. We count on your work landing when you said it would.
- Leave files organized, logically named, and properly layered so the next person can pick them up without a walkthrough.
- Work in Google Workspace, Figma, Slack, and Productive (project management software), join the internal and client reviews that involve your work, and stay reachable during the hours we agree on.
What you bring:
- At least 3 years of professional experience across brand, digital, and campaign design. Agency or studio experience is a plus but not required if the work is strong.
- A portfolio that shows range and finish across brand and visual identity application, websites, campaigns, and print production.
- Expert command of Figma and strong working knowledge of Adobe Creative Suite. Motion, illustration, or retouching skills are a meaningful plus.
- The ability to take a brief or a set of notes, elevate it with your own craft judgment, and return finished work.
- Experience freelancing across multiple clients. You're self-managed, professional about scope and invoicing, and honest about your availability.
- Comfort with direct feedback and fast iteration.
- Clear, proactive written communication. Much of this work happens remotely and asynchronously.
- Comfort presenting your work to clients is a plus. The role occasionally calls for it.
What success looks like:
In your first engagement:
- Your work holds the Fort West standard.
- Your hours track to your estimates, and you flag extra time before you need it.
- The deadlines you commit to are ones the team can plan around.
Over time:
- Our Design Director spends more time on direction, strategy, and client partnership, and less on production.
- Fort West takes on more design work without the quality bar moving.
- Anyone on the team can pick up your files and keep going.
Engagement terms:
- This is an independent contractor role. You'll be engaged as a 1099 independent contractor.
- Before each engagement begins, we'll agree on scope, expected hours, and duration.
- Hours are not guaranteed, and the arrangement is non-exclusive.
- You're paid hourly at the agreed rate. Invoices are submitted monthly, with payment on Net 30 terms.
- You supply your own hardware. We provide access to Fort West's Figma, Slack, and Productive workspaces for the length of the engagement.
- Day-to-day work is remote-friendly, but this is a local engagement. We'll occasionally ask for on-site time in Lake Oswego for kickoffs, working sessions, and production days, always with plenty of notice.
- A signed contractor agreement and NDA are required before any work begins. Work product is assigned to Fort West and, where applicable, to our clients.
- You can show the work in your portfolio by mutual written agreement, subject to client confidentiality and release timing. We want you to be able to show what you made.
How to apply
Send your portfolio, resume, hourly rate, and current weekly availability to hello@fortwest.com. Rate and availability are required for consideration.
We care most about the portfolio. Point us to the two or three projects that you are most proud of and tell us specifically what you did versus what the rest of the team did. If you've worked as a contractor inside an agency, say so.
We review submissions on a rolling basis and will follow up with designers whose work and availability fit what we need.
