Senior Jewelry CAD Designer — Sculpture & Production Systems

Location: Fully Remote (Open to talent in LATAM, South Africa [SA], and PH)

Type: Full-Time (Independent Contractor)

Reports to: Design Director

Position Summary

We make jewelry that means something. Our charms, talismans, and sculptural pieces are built around stories — of strength, intention, and the people who wear them. Behind that emotion is serious craft: highly detailed figurative and organic forms, demi-fine and fine production, and a flagship Charm Builder that lets every customer compose a piece that is theirs alone. We are now bringing our CAD program in-house, and we are hiring its owner.

You will be the master of jewelry CAD across our entire line. First and foremost, you sculpt: faces, figures, botanical and symbolic motifs, modeled at a level of artistry that survives casting and delights in the hand. Second, you standardize: you will build our parametric component library, file standards, and QC system in Rhino and Grasshopper, so every future model starts from a strong foundation instead of a blank file.

Finally, you partner on cost: working directly with our Production Manager — who owns costing and our factory relationships — you will build the CAD-side engine that estimates what a piece should cost in metal, stones, plating, and labor at the CAD stage, so we design to our price points and our team negotiates from facts.

You will sit on the design team, reporting to our Design Director, with a build-it-from-scratch mandate and an explicit Head of CAD growth path as the function and team grow.

Key Responsibilities

1. Sculptural CAD (Digital Master Model Making)

Build high-resolution digital master models of complex, organic, and figurative designs — faces, figures, botanical and symbolic motifs — modeled to a level of artistry that survives casting and delights in the hand.
Ensure every model is production-ready: account accurately for casting shrinkage compensation, minimum wall thickness, setting allowances, and polishing tolerances.
Own STL hygiene and print-readiness for resin casting patterns, even when physical printing happens at the vendor.

2. CAD Standards & Preset Library

Build our parametric component library — shanks, bails, jump rings, setting seats, charm blanks — in Rhino and Grasshopper, so reusable parts regenerate to any size from one definition.
Establish file, naming, and tolerance standards, QC checklists, and tech-pack templates for clean vendor handoff.
Set the design-for-manufacturability (DFM) foundation that every future model starts from.

3. Cost Engineering Partnership

Build and maintain the CAD-side engine of our should-cost model: metal weight (with casting waste factors), auto-extracted stone schedules, plating surface-area calculations, and labor complexity scoring per SKU.
Work in close partnership with our Production Manager — you supply the CAD-stage numbers that make vendor negotiations fact-based.
Use the model two ways: design-to-cost (adjusting a piece before sampling to hit target landed cost) and negotiation support (line-by-line comparison against vendor quotes).

4. Automation & New Technology

Automate repetitive modeling and cost-extraction tasks with Grasshopper definitions.
Pragmatically adopt AI concept-generation and rendering tools — leveraging AI for concept iteration and parametric CAD for the production model — and continuously evaluate what is next.

5. Production Partnership

Deliver clean file handoff to manufacturers, run sample-review feedback loops, and provide CAD-side support during quoting and negotiation.

Qualifications

Master-Level Digital Sculpting: Advanced mastery of ZBrush is strongly preferred. A strong portfolio of sculpted, organic pieces that physically shipped (faces, figures, organic and symbolic forms) is the gating skill for this role.
Strong English for internal communications.
Systems Mastery: Deep expertise in Rhino and a functional command of Grasshopper (or equivalent demonstrable parametric library work). You must be able to share at least one systems artifact you built: a component library, Grasshopper definition, or technical standards documentation.
Industry Longevity: 7–10+ years in jewelry CAD, including significant production-side experience working in or directly facing a manufacturer.
Deep Casting Fluency: Expert understanding of shrinkage, minimum walls, setting allowances, and plating specifications.
Cost Estimation Literacy: Working experience with CAD-stage cost estimation — you can talk waste factors, stone schedules, and standard minutes without notes, and you enjoy formatting the data to keep numbers sharp.
Communication: Excellent written and spoken English, self-direction, and complete comfort owning a craft function solo on a remote team.

Nice to Have

Vendor quoting or negotiation exposure; experience with manufacturers across multiple regions.
KeyShot or V-Ray rendering; jewelry ERP exposure (Gemini, PIRO, JewelSteps); AI concept-tool fluency.
Fine-art or traditional goldsmithing background; experience training or QC-ing other modelers.

Hardware Requirements

Hardware Setup: A dedicated, high-performance Apple Mac computer is required for system and software pipeline alignment. (Candidates will be asked to verify machine specifications during the technical interview stage).

How We Hire

Portfolio screen ➔ 30-minute technical conversation ➔ a paid one-week test piece (modeled from our sketch, delivered with a tech pack and a cost estimate) ➔ a live working session ➔ a final conversation with our Design Director and Production Manager. We pay fairly for your test time, and we move in weeks, not months.

Compensation & Benefits

Competitive Location-Calibrated Pay: Compensation is set at the top tier of your local market for this specific craft. We are explicitly looking for the best global talent and are offering a premium, flexible salary baseline depending on the candidate's portfolio, technical systems experience, and location.
Professional Remote Independence: Fully remote, with a requirement of at least 3 hours of daily workspace overlap with US time zones.
Full-time Independent Contractor - 3 month ramp up period as probationary
Quarterly product stipend and an executive 50% employee discount.
Annual professional learning and development stipend.
A true build-it-from-scratch mandate: Your library, your standards, your costing system — named, visible authorship at a brand whose work is publicly celebrated, with an explicit Head of CAD growth path.

61111796628 - Senior Jewelry CAD Designer — Sculpture & Production Systems - 20023