Creative Director, Art Direction

About the Role

The Creative Director, Art Direction plays a critical role in shaping Athleta’s visual identity—bringing to life powerful, human-centered stories rooted in movement, style, and performance. This role leads the art direction of all Athleta location and studio photography and video, creating concepts ad translating them into elevated, product-forward narratives that span brand campaigns, digital channels, social media, packaging, and in-store environments.

You will partner closely with the creative leadership team to define the creative approach for each season, producing emotionally resonant, premium imagery that reflects Athleta’s values, purpose, and always-on brand platform. This position requires exceptional conceptual thinking, a refined visual eye, operational excellence, and a proven ability to deliver world-class storytelling at scale.
What You'll Do

Lead On-Set Art Direction 

• Lead art direction for all on-set location and studio photography and video for women’s and girls’ apparel, ensuring premium quality and alignment with Athleta’s brand standards. 

• Oversee shot execution—including composition, lighting, framing, casting considerations, styling POV, and prop integration. 

• Build and deliver mood boards, creative decks, shot lists, and direction documents that guide photographers, stylists, producers, and on-set crews. 

• Direct live shoots with clarity and purpose, ensuring every image reflects Athleta’s elevated aesthetic and brand values. 

• Ensure all production aligns to budget, timing, and quality benchmarks. 

Drive Conceptual Storytelling 

• Create compelling seasonal concepts based on seasonal marketing briefs, in partnership with editorial, styling and marketing leads  

• Translate seasonal concepts into cohesive, elevated and aspirational product stories 

• Push creative boundaries to deliver fresh, innovative content that resonates across brand channels. 

• Ensure storytelling ladders up to Athleta’s purpose-driven platform, weaving performance, style, innovation, community, and culture into imagery. 

• Create breakthrough, emotionally resonant imagery across brand channels 

Own End-to-End Creative Production 

• Communicate clearly and confidently with photographers, directors, videographers, stylists, models, agency and production partners to align on creative vision. 

• Work with producers, PMs, and DAM teams to ensure seamless workflow 

• Manage shot lists, timelines, and budgets across high-volume production 

• Elevate processes, tools, and systems to drive creative efficiency and scale 

• Ensure on-set teams are accountable for delivering final assets that meet the brief and uphold Athleta’s standards of excellence. 

Collaborate Across the Brand 

• Partner with marketing, agency partners, merchandising, styling, and retail teams 

• Present creative direction to leadership and cross-functional partners 

• Align on-set crews to deliver premium imagery that brings concepts to life 

Lead + Mentor 

• Support and coach creative team members 

• Foster a culture of innovation, curiosity, and high craft 

Who You Are

• A strong portfolio demonstrating world-class art direction for location and studio photography + video, particularly in women’s fashion, lifestyle, social or performance categories. 

• 8+ years of experience creating for commercial studios, in-house or agency, fashion and consumer goods, retail, or e-commerce industries is a must. 

• Expert understanding of composition, lighting, color, movement, and emotional storytelling. 

• Deep understanding of photography and videography, lighting, composition, color, movement, and storytelling 

• Experience in high-volume, fast-paced production environments 

• Strong conceptual, communication and presentation skills 

• Ability to lead, inspire, and influence cross-functional teams in a fast-paced, deadline-driven environment. Proficiency in Adobe Creative Suite; familiarity with Capture One + DAM systems and Figma. 

• Retail/e-comm experience is a plus