Five years at Gucci: how Grain’s Creative Director inspires creativity

Exactly sixteen years ago, Madelyn Postman, Creative Director of Grain, started her career as a designer at one of the world’s most famous fashion companies: Gucci.

Within five years, she became an influential creative director and production specialist at Gucci Group, where her key projects included art directing the first ever Gucci and Sergio Rossi websites.

“It was very challenging at first,” says Madelyn, “learning all about Gucci’s branding in every detail and becoming a part of the ‘brand police’ not only across the company and its divisions but also with licensees where the relationships are always more challenging. Then we moved into the exciting times of acquiring brands — when Gucci became Gucci Group —  and started to integrate all the newly bought companies like Yves Saint Laurent, Boucheron, Balenciaga, Alexander McQueen and Sergio Rossi as well as starting up Stella McCartney.”

“Soon, my remit expanded to include art directing one of luxury’s first ecommerce offerings — the Gucci website — and designing and developing the new Sergio Rossi packaging after Gucci Group acquired the brand.”

Five exciting years at Gucci Group has shaped the way the Grain director perceives brands and appreciates meticulous attention to detail. At Gucci the stakes were high and everything had to be executed perfectly, and perfectly on time, meeting deadlines within a tightly-controlled commercial cycle. For example, the shoot from the fashion shows and the associated core collection look books had to be available within hours so buyers could see products and order them, in turn prescribing how many products were actually manufactured. Similarly, advertising campaign shoots and media deadlines wait for nobody.

The creative process had to thrive under these conditions: “Working in an international fashion company where you live and breathe luxury, I was required to meticulously coordinate branding and design including materials, colours and textures across different applications from digital to print to packaging.”

Now with her own business, the co-owner of Grain Creative combines business insight with creative inspiration when she works with entrepreneurs, enabling them to communicate with their audiences beautifully and effectively.

You can read more about Madelyn’s work at Gucci here.