Lead Baker – One Garden Brighton
Salary: £32,630 – £35,496 per annum Hours: 40 hours per week, 5 days out of 7 (annualised – more hours in summer, fewer in winter) Location: One Garden Brighton, Stanmer Park, Brighton BN1 9SE Reports to: One Garden Brighton Manager Contract: Permanent, full time – interim/temporary appointments also considered for experienced bakers available immediately Closing date: Monday 31 August 2026 (applications reviewed as they arrive – apply early)
The baking
We're looking for a qualified, experienced Lead Baker to run the house bakery at One Garden Brighton, where everything sweet on the counter is made from scratch by our own team.
This is first and foremost a cakes and pastries role – beautiful cakes, seasonal sweet treats and small-batch pastries for our café, shop and events, with bread baked at weekends for our busiest days. You'll lead a small bakery team, with a bakery assistant producing the traybakes and everyday bakes and our kitchen team preparing sandwiches in house alongside you – and you'll help us realise our ambition to bring our full savoury range in house too.
If your passion is cake craft and patisserie, with the range to turn your hand to bread and viennoiserie, this role plays to your strengths.
What you'll do
- Lead daily production of cakes, pastries and sweet treats for the café, shop and events
- Bake bread at weekends
- Develop seasonal recipes and retail lines using local and estate produce, and expand our in-house range
- Plan production, ordering, stock rotation and deliveries; control costs, margins and waste
- Maintain high standards of quality, presentation, food safety, hygiene and allergen records
- Mentor our bakery team and apprentice, and support events and promotional activity, including occasional evenings
The setting
One Garden Brighton is the restored Grade II listed walled garden at the heart of Stanmer Park – an RHS Partner Garden run by Plumpton College, free to enter and open every day of the year, with a café, shop, plant nursery, events programme and our newly opened Sussex Butterfly Gardens. Sustainability runs through everything we do, from our reusable cup scheme to estate produce from the Plumpton College farm and dairy – and with a Head Barista in place, your bakes are served alongside seriously good coffee.
We're also home to the Plumpton School of Bakery, and Plumpton College is the UK's first provider of the Level 3 Lead Baker Apprenticeship. You won't be undertaking an apprenticeship – you'll be the professional our apprentice bakers learn from, working alongside our bakery curriculum team including Master Baker Aidan Chapman: three decades in the industry, formerly Head Baker at London's Celtic Bakers, founder of the Phoenix Bakery and a Bread Ahead instructor. Few bakery roles come with that professional community on the doorstep.
Who we're looking for
Essential: a qualified baker with several years' experience and real strength in cakes and patisserie; current food hygiene certificate and a relevant food safety qualification; strong attention to detail in a fast-paced environment; a collaborative, flexible and reliable team player with excellent communication skills.
Desirable: bread and viennoiserie skills (sourdough a bonus); a creative eye for specials and new product development; knowledge of the Brighton food scene; full UK driving licence.
What we offer
- £32,630 – £35,496 per annum
- 22 days' annual leave plus 8 bank holidays (TOIL where worked)
- NEST pension, free onsite parking, and CPD with access to Plumpton College's bakery expertise and training kitchens
- A supportive, sustainability-minded team in a unique, growing visitor attraction in the South Downs, minutes from Brighton
Available now? We'd be happy to consider experienced bakers on an interim basis while we complete our permanent recruitment – interim appointments are welcome to apply for the permanent role. Tell us your availability when you apply.
Pay: £32,630.00-£35,496.00 per year
Benefits:
- Company events
- Company pension
- Discounted or free food
- Flexitime
- Free parking
- Health & wellbeing programme
- On-site parking
- Sick pay
- Store discount
Work Location: In person
