Product Design Engineer

Product Design Engineer

London, N4 4 days in our office, 1 day from home (choose from Tue–Thu) £40 - 50k per annum + equity

About Shellworks

At Shellworks, we're on a mission to make plastic waste a thing of the past. We're creating a new generation of materials - sustainable, high-performing, and designed to disappear. By reimagining how materials are made, we're tackling one of the world's most urgent environmental challenges.

About the Role

We're looking for a Product Design Engineer to help us bring the next wave of products made from Vivomer to life. You'll sit at the intersection of design, engineering, and customer collaboration – helping brands in the personal care space turn ideas into manufacturable, beautiful, and sustainable products. From shaping proposals with the sales team to leading technical execution, you'll own the process end to end. This is a hands-on role for someone who can balance creativity and rigour, moving comfortably between CAD, prototyping, and commercial discussions. You'll join a small, ambitious engineering team and work closely with our founders, designers, and manufacturing partners to deliver bespoke packaging solutions that customers love - and that help us scale impact. You'll play a direct role in driving revenue growth, ensuring our technical capabilities keep pace with expanding sales opportunities and enabling Shellworks to win and deliver more bespoke projects.

Key Responsibilities

As Product Design Engineer at Shellworks, you'll:

• Own full cycle product development from concept through to production - across bespoke customer projects and new catalogue innovations
• Translate customer needs into practical design solutions that balance form, function, manufacturability, and sustainability
• Collaborate with Sales and Design to develop proposals, pitch ideas, and win new business through credible technical input
• Plan and execute projects independently structuring work and managing priorities in a high ambiguity, fast paced environment
• Lead prototyping and validation using CAD, physical models, and iterative testing to de-risk and refine designs
• Champion design communication through compelling visuals, presentations, and technical storytelling that build trust with customers
• Continuously improve our development process helping us evolve how we scope, quote, and deliver bespoke work as we move toward larger scale partnerships.

Must Haves

• 2-4 years' experience in a physical product environment (consumer goods, design consultancy, or in-house product development)
• Has taken projects through multiple development stages, from concept and prototyping to production handover and is ready to own the full process in a smaller, more autonomous team
• Is fluent in CAD and design-for-manufacture, able to explore trade-offs and make informed material and process decisions
• Communicates ideas visually and verbally with clarity and confidence - ideally with a background or strong interest in industrial design
• Is proactive, structured, and able to plan effectively in an evolving, ambiguous environment
• Builds rapport easily with customer and cross-functional teams, combining technical expertise with a commercial mindset

Nice-to-Haves

• Experience in personal care, FMCG, or packaging design
• Exposure to sustainable materials or novel manufacturing processes
• Time spent in a design agency environment working on multidisciplinary projects
• Experience managing budgets, quotes, or small project streams

What We Offer

21 days holiday + birthday off + 27–31st December (plus public holidays) Growth and development opportunities as we scale Competitive salary + equity options Regular socials + daily catered lunch at the office A tight-knit, mission-driven team working on something that matters

Join Us

At Shellworks, you'll join a team that's redefining what materials can do — and how design and engineering can help solve global challenges. If you're an adaptable product design engineer who loves turning complex problems into elegant, manufacturable solutions, we'd love to hear from you.