1 day / week
Ongoing direction. Enough to keep brand and product on the same decision.
€5–7k/month
Fractional Design Lead
When you need design leadership,not another full-time hire.Fractional Design Lead for founders who need brand and product to move together — 1–2 days a week,senior judgment,hands-on craft.
For whom
Direction and a craft bar, before a design department.
- Seed to Series B, and scale-ups that do not yet have a design lead.
- Teams that need direction and a craft bar, without building a large design organisation to get there.
Ninety days
What changes in 90 days
1
Clarify the real design decision
Name the choice that keeps returning under another label: what the brand is for, what the product should feel like, and what to stop.
2
Make brand and product coherent
One frame the site, the product, and the founder conversation can share, so they stop describing different companies.
3
Leave a practical operating rhythm
How decisions get made, who owns them, and where hands-on work actually happens. Something the team can keep.
Included
What the days are for
- Design direction and decision-making.
- Brand and product systems, held to one craft bar.
- Hands-on work where it changes the outcome.
- Mentoring for junior and mid designers already on the team.
- AI in the workflow as leverage, not theatre.
How we work
A small commitment. Senior judgment.
Remote-first, across the Netherlands and the EU. Hybrid in the Netherlands when being in the room is the useful part.
2 days / week
Direction, plus hands-on work in the places that matter.
€9–12k/month
4-week pilot
A bounded start. See the fit before it becomes a weekly rhythm.
Indication, ex VAT. 1 day/week ≈ €5–7k/month. 2 days/week ≈ €9–12k/month. Or a day rate of €1,100–€1,350.
Selected work
Where direction changed the work
A few places where brand, product, and the story had to hold together.
Agrotech and community
Cropsie
A clearer way to explain an agtech proposition where field reality, climate pressure, and adoption had to meet.
Read more
Deeptech
Kite Magnetics
Deeptech communication reordered so technical substance could become investor understanding.
Read more
Sport and development
Dutch Lions FC
A multi-stakeholder sports organization clarified through identity, pathway thinking, and communication hierarchy.
Read moreWatStemmenWij, and the rest of the selected work, sits on the work page.
Contact
Bring the question that keeps returning.
If design leadership is the missing seat, send the unresolved version: what is stuck between brand and product, and what a clearer rhythm would change.
mail@studioerwinsala.com