Interaction Designer

At The National Archives, we safeguard, preserve and open up the UK’s documentary heritage, from born digital government records to court judgments and historic datasets. Our work supports democratic accountability, strengthens the public’s right to know, and enables researchers, legal professionals and the public to explore evidence that shapes our collective memory. You’ll join the Access to Digital Records team to design inclusive, intuitive services that make this heritage usable at scale and with confidence.

Why this role matters:

We’re progressing a significant programme of user experience improvements across two high profile services:
• Find Case Law — evolving search and discovery to keep pace with a rapidly growing corpus of judgments.
• Access Your Records — scaling search, rendering and accessibility so born digital public records are easier to discover and use.

These changes need dedicated interaction design expertise to deliver at pace while safeguarding quality, accessibility and trust.

What you’ll do:

• Design end to end journeys, flows, wireframes and prototypes; iterate with user research and data led insight.
• Apply accessibility first principles (WCAG 2.2), progressive enhancement and web standards to ensure our services work for everyone.
• Collaborate in agile, multi disciplinary teams; partner with engineers to turn designs into robust, performant interfaces.
• Contribute to shared patterns and libraries (e.g. Figma); participate in critiques, show and tells and our internal design community.
• Communicate design decisions clearly to colleagues and external stakeholders, supporting a culture of inclusive, user centred design.

What you’ll bring:

• Solid experience of user centred and interaction design for complex or live services.
• Strong prototyping skills and clear documentation that makes implementation straightforward.
• Confidence working with user researchers, interpreting findings and iterating designs.
• Practical understanding of accessibility and inclusion (WCAG 2.2).
• Experience collaborating in agile teams and contributing to shared design practices.

Desirable: familiarity with GOV.UK Design System patterns and service standard assessments.

Working pattern & eligibility:

This role is based at Kew with hybrid working; most staff spend at least 60% of their time on site (more when new to role or during development phases).

This is a full time post. However, requests for part-time working, flexible working and job share will be considered, taking into account at all times the operational needs of the Department.

Applicants must be resident in the UK and eligible to work in the UK Civil Service.

What we offer:

• The chance to design services with real public value and long term impact.
• A supportive, collaborative design community and opportunities to mentor and be mentored.
• Flexible, hybrid working with our base at Kew.

For full details and to apply, please click the link following "Museum Website" below.

Museum Website: https://nationalarchives.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/Careers/job/Kew/Interaction-Designer_JR200763