In-house Design Lead

SINCLAIRS HOTELS & RESORTS
Design Lead — Interiors & Architecture
Kolkata • On-site, extensive travel to properties and sites • Full-Time • 6+ Years Experience
About Sinclairs
Sinclairs Hotels & Resorts is one of eastern India's most established hospitality names, operating nine properties across the country's hills, plains and coastline — from Himalayan resorts to a beachfront hotel in the Andamans. The group is a listed company with a completely debt-free balance sheet and a substantial cash surplus, now in an active expansion phase alongside a deliberate transformation of how it runs: its commercial discipline, its people systems, and its technology.
About the Role
You will be the group's first in-house Design Lead, owning interior design and architecture across the estate. You will design the guest-facing spaces — rooms, lobbies, restaurants, bars, banquet halls, spas — and the back-of-house that makes them work, and you will take that design from concept through working drawings to a finished, snagged, opened space. Where projects need an external architect or specialist consultant, you will select, brief and manage them; the design intent stays with you.
This is a hands-on role. You will draw — in AutoCAD, in SketchUp, in whatever the project needs — and you will be on site in Chalsa, Kalimpong or Port Blair checking that what was drawn is what is being built. You will work closely with the general managers, the engineering and projects teams, the Purchase Manager on FF&E, the Group Executive Chef on kitchens, and contractors and vendors across some of the most logistically difficult locations in the country.
We want someone who has both an interior designer's eye and an architect's discipline: who can make a space feel like the place it is in, and can also read a structural drawing, coordinate services, write a BOQ and hold a contractor to it.
Where This Role Goes
This is the founding design seat in a group that is about to build more than it has in decades. You will need to build a team once you are embedded in the business, and as the group grows so will you.
Progression: Head of Design and Projects for the group as the estate and the pipeline grow.
Key ResponsibilitiesDesign & Concept
• Develop the design language for Sinclairs — rooted in each property's region and setting, consistent as a group — and apply it across new builds, refurbishments and outlets.
• Produce concept designs, mood boards, space plans and 3D visualisations for guest rooms, public areas, F&B outlets, banqueting, spa and wellness, and exterior and landscape elements.
• Design for how a hotel actually operates: guest flow, service flow, back-of-house adjacency, kitchen and stores logistics, housekeeping, accessibility and safety.
Technical Design & Documentation
• Produce complete working drawing sets: plans, sections, elevations, reflected ceiling plans, joinery and furniture details, finishes schedules, and MEP coordination drawings.
• Prepare material, finish and FF&E specifications, BOQs and cost estimates; value-engineer without losing the design.
• Coordinate structural, MEP, kitchen, lighting, acoustic and landscape inputs into a single coordinated set; resolve clashes on the drawing board, not on site.
• Ensure compliance with building codes, fire and life-safety norms, accessibility standards and local approvals; support statutory submissions.
Site Execution
• Supervise execution on site: contractor briefings, shop drawing review, mock-up approvals, quality checks, progress against programme and snagging through to handover.
• Resolve site issues fast and document the decisions; keep as-built drawings current.
• Travel regularly to properties and project sites, including remote hill and island locations, and stay as long as the project needs.
FF&E, Vendors & Procurement
• Own FF&E design and specification — furniture, lighting, soft furnishings, art, accessories — and manage sampling, prototyping and approvals.
• Work with the Purchase Manager on sourcing, including imported furniture and local carpenter-built alternatives; compare on cost, quality, lead time and durability in hotel use.
• Build and maintain a vendor and materials library: contractors, fabricators, suppliers and specialists proven to deliver in our locations.
Consultants & Project Management
• Select, brief and manage external architects, MEP consultants, landscape designers, lighting designers and specialist contractors where projects need them; hold them to the design intent, programme and budget.
• Run design programmes and deliverables for multiple concurrent projects; report status, risks and decisions to leadership clearly.
Standards & Systems
• Write and maintain the group's design standards: room and outlet typologies, finishes palettes, FF&E standards, signage and wayfinding, and back-of-house specifications.
• Keep drawings, specifications, samples and project records organised in the group's systems so every project builds on the last.
Hard SkillsRequired
• AutoCAD — expert; fast, clean, standards-compliant 2D drafting is the daily tool of this role.
• SketchUp with a rendering engine (V-Ray, Enscape or Lumion) for 3D modelling and visualisation.
• Adobe Photoshop and InDesign for presentation boards, mood boards and design documentation.
• Excel for BOQs, cost estimates, FF&E schedules and finishes schedules.
• Ability to read and coordinate structural and MEP drawings.
Strongly Valued
• Revit or ArchiCAD for BIM-based documentation, particularly for the new-build.
• 3ds Max with V-Ray or Corona for high-quality hospitality visualisation.
• MS Project or equivalent for design and construction programming.
• Comfort with modern productivity and AI tools — for concept exploration, specification writing, quantity take-offs and documentation.
What We're Looking ForRequired
• A degree in architecture (B.Arch) or interior design, with demonstrable capability across both disciplines; Council of Architecture registration is an advantage.
• 6+ years in interior design and architecture, with at least two hospitality projects — hotels, resorts, restaurants or bars — taken from concept to completed, operating space.
• A portfolio that shows both design quality and technical depth: concept work and the working drawings and details behind it.
• Site supervision experience with contractors and fabricators; comfortable resolving issues on a live site.
• Hands-on experience with FF&E specification, sampling and vendor management.
• Experience preparing BOQs, specifications and cost estimates, and value-engineering against a budget.
• Clear communication with non-designers — general managers, engineers, chefs, contractors and leadership.
• Willingness to travel extensively and to be on site for extended periods in remote locations.
Strongly Valued
• Resort or destination-hotel experience, especially in hill, forest or coastal settings.
• Experience with regional and vernacular design — timber, stone, local crafts — and with sustainable and climate-responsive design.
• Experience delivering projects in logistically difficult locations.
• Commercial kitchen and back-of-house planning experience.
• Experience managing external consultants on a client-side or in-house team.
• Experience with imported furniture sourcing or working directly with furniture workshops and carpenters.
Who Thrives Here
A designer who is happy in site boots. You care how a space feels and you care that the door swings the right way, the AHU fits above the ceiling and the joinery detail can actually be built by the carpenter in Kalimpong. You draw clean, you decide fast, and you do not hand a problem to a consultant that you could solve yourself. You want to see nine hotels and a new-build carry your work — not a folder of renders for someone else's project.

Work arrangement
No