Senior commissioning editor (12 month FTC)

Location: The role will be based at our Sheffield or London office, with a blend of in-office (3 days) and homeworking (2 days) per week.

This is a fantastic opportunity to join a thriving commercial imprint, and head up an internationally successful list.

Headline is a division of Hachette UK, and home to the very best of commercial publishing, with authors including Maggie O’Farrell, Matthew Perry, Matthew McConaughey and Oasis. Part of Headline at Hachette UK, Welbeck Illustrated has a mission to publish beautiful books that find a passionate audience in every corner of the world. Our talented team creates illustrated titles that are published in more than 30 languages and 60 countries, covering a broad range of subjects across lifestyle, food, drink, fashion, music, film, sport and more. We work with brands from FIFA to Formula 1 and Chanel to the Rolling Stones.

We are looking for an experienced illustrated commissioner to cover our internationally successful fashion and reference lists for a year. You will be joining a creative team of skilled editorial, design and publishing colleagues at Welbeck Illustrated, working together to produce illustrated books that sell to millions of readers in markets all around the world.

What you'll be doing

Fashion and reference are subjects at the heart of Welbeck's publishing – we excel in creating gorgeous books that people love to read and display. The successful candidate will thrive on producing a busy list of titles, from our global hit Little Books of Fashion series to various IP projects and successful partnerships with the likes of Kew and Liberty.

Working with our in-house design and editorial teams, the Senior Commissioning Editor will take over our well-established fashion and reference list, overseeing the production of titles already commissioned and bolstering the list with commissions of their own.

Part of the Headline family at Hachette, Welbeck is an exciting and creative place to make books. Here’s what two members of our team have to say:

“Welbeck is a buzzing imprint where everyone has a voice – you can channel your creativity and at the same time become integral to the team. Not only do we get to make beautiful books that entertain, engage and inspire, but we get to work with the most talented people in the industry. What’s not to love?”

Heather Boisseau, Editorial Director, OH imprint

“I know it’s a cliché, but no two days at Welbeck are the same, with such a unique range of titles on all the subjects we love, like music, fashion, sport and cookery. It’s this variety of titles that make it such a fantastic place to work, with the challenge of shaping the books to appeal to our stylish readers. The close collaboration between our design and editorial teams really does make for the best-looking books!”

James Empringham, Art Director

Who we are looking for

Are you an experienced publisher of illustrated books?

Would you thrive on the challenge of running a busy, creative, exciting list of beautiful books?

We would love to hear from you!

This fixed term role is suited to someone who balances creativity with organisation, and has a strong commercial instinct. A busy list, it requires the management of several projects – helped by our experienced editorial team – as well as the creative spark to come up with new ideas and lead the creative vision for your books.

Our commitment

Hachette employs people on the basis of their abilities. We aim to attract and develop talent from a base as broad as the world of readers we want to reach, with a wide and representative range of age, faith, disability, race, gender, sexuality and socio-economic, regional and cultural backgrounds.

We want everyone to have the opportunity to perform at their best during our recruitment process. If you need any adjustments, you can let us know at the ‘Reasonable Adjustments’ section of your application. We’ll make sure you’re supported throughout the process.

The Book Trade Charity offers financial support to people looking to enter the book trade but who may struggle to afford the costs of attending interviews and undertaking junior roles. For more information visit https://btbs.org/grants

We welcome and encourage applications from candidates who are under-represented in the creative industries.

Please make sure that you state in your application that you found this role via Creative Access.