The Manufacturing Engineer sits between Allied Maker’s Design team and the outside world of partner vendors. When a tolerance doesn’t behave, a finish won’t hold, a material fights the process, or a vendor asks a question that could change the part, this is the person who answers, and then loops back to Design with the improvement. The Manufacturing Engineer is a hands-on problem solver whose work keeps fixtures buildable, beautiful, and on schedule.
Key Responsibilities
Vendor Technical Liaison
- Serve as the primary technical contact between Design Engineering and partner vendors (machining, spinning, casting, glass, alabaster, wood)
- Resolve vendor questions about tolerances, materials, finishes, and process capability while preserving design intent
- Support QC on supplier quality issues: investigate root cause, implement corrective actions, and verify effectiveness
Design for Manufacturability (DFM)
- Review designs with Design Engineering for manufacturability, tolerance realism, assembly fit, and cost before release
- Propose actionable design improvements to improve yield, cost, and schedule while maintaining design intent
- Maintain a library of DFM lessons learned
Process & Tolerance Ownership
- Own tolerance stack-up analysis on critical features
- Resolve conflicts between design intent and vendor capability
- Define inspection and acceptance criteria with QC
- Lead first-article reviews and process qualification for new vendors and parts
Continuous Improvement
- Partner with Assembly, Pre-Production, and Quality to resolve recurring issues from vendor parts or upstream design
- Track the cost of poor quality and lead-time impact from vendor issues and report trends
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical, Industrial, or Manufacturing Engineering
- 3–5 years of manufacturing engineering experience with vendor interaction
- Strong knowledge of machining, spinning, casting, and finishing processes
- Fluent in GD&T (ASME Y14.5), tolerance stack-ups, and process capability
- Strong communication skills across technical and non-technical stakeholders
- Organized, decisive, and able to own issues through resolution
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience in lighting, luxury goods, architectural hardware, or custom manufacturing
- CAD experience (Fusion or similar)
- Familiarity with UL 1598 / UL 8750
- Lean / Six Sigma experience
- Experience working with Northeast US vendors
Compensation & Benefits
- Salary: $95,000 – $120,000 annually (based on experience)
- Discretionary bonus
- Medical, dental, vision insurance
- 401(k) with company match
- PTO, holidays, parental leave
- Employer-paid life and disability insurance
- Employee assistance program
- Safety shoe and eyewear allowance
- Employee product discount
Work Environment & Physical Requirements
- On-site at the Glen Cove workshop
- Mix of desk work, shop floor time, and vendor interaction
- Active shop environment; PPE required where applicable
- Occasional travel to vendor facilities
About Allied Maker
Allied Maker is an American design and manufacturing studio creating luxury-crafted lighting fixtures. Based in New York, each piece is made to order by a dedicated team of craftspeople, with a focus on authentic materials, refined form, and enduring quality.
The studio operates at the intersection of design, engineering, and manufacturing. Ryden Rizzo leads product design and form. Lanette Rizzo leads design direction, production, and client strategy. Together, they set a standard where design integrity, engineering, and performance are inseparable.
Allied Maker is widely specified by leading architects and designers and continues to expand its capabilities while maintaining a singular focus: deliver artisan-crafted, highly engineered, sophisticated yet simple lighting design solutions.
Salary Range Annually
$95,000—$120,000 USD
