It was ironic to read Cal Newport’s Deep Work on the Kindle app on my iPhone, considering that the device is full of alluring distractions. The first part of the book argues why deep, focused and uninterrupted work is valuable, with section titles including: Deep work helps you quickly learn hard things Deep work helps you produce at an … Read more

  Do you know one thing that most successful business people share? They read at least 30 minutes a day. Reading helps you sharpen your thinking and it gives you new knowledge and skills for life and for business. We recommend that you start 2015 with these 3 must-read books that will help you excel … Read more

A note in our veg box this morning made me think about the importance of authenticity in branding. We have been enjoying Riverford‘s organic fruit, veg and meat box deliveries weekly for about six years. The Riverford newsletter, written by founder Guy Watson, who started delivering veggie boxes locally to friends in Devon nearly 25 … Read more

Yes: Gucci, leather and saving the environment do fit together – no odd one out here. Lucy Siegle’s article ‘Luxury Leather and the Amazon’ mentions that 95% of Gucci products are made in Tuscany. The leather is sourced from a ‘deforestation-free zone’. An interesting article for everyone interested in sustainable luxury.

A quick recommendation on how to spend these sunny days – Ainsley’s Ultimate Barbecue Bible – though perhaps more fitting for the weekend than on Monday morning – fire up that barbecue and enjoy!

This article on Fast Company on How To Make Your Own Luck dates back to 2003 but it resurfaced recently. Definitely worth a read!

Refuse to Choose!: A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love. Scanners unite! Barbara Sher has defined a category of people who have many interests as Scanners. She explains why Scanners may flit from one project to the next without ever completing anything, and provides a host of tools from the Scanner Daybook to … Read more

Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence. This is one of those books which can really change your life if you take it to heart. The basic premise is to follow your dreams – sounds lovely but difficult in reality, right? The first step, like in … Read more

As the officially coronated Spreadsheet Queen (with the recently bestowed adjunct title of Micro-Managing Brand Freak), I thought I would really like the system set out in Getting Things Done by David Allen. But in short, I hated it because it is so prescriptive. Rather than teaching a man to fish, it tells him exactly … Read more

Never Check E-mail in the Morning: And Other Unexpected Strategies for Making Your Work Life Work by Julie Morgenstern. The title of this book shows the clear mark of a publisher trying to increase sales. The former title was Making Work Work. The drawback of the new, catchier and curiosity-provoking title is that it doesn’t … Read more

If you are a type geek, you may have noticed that we’re using Frutiger as our company font, with the similar Carto Gothic appearing on the website. Not only do we love Frutiger, but its actual reason for existing ties in neatly with our own areas of design interest and experience. Frutiger was designed by … Read more

The book Promotional Packaging and Design offers a compact overview of some great ideas in packaging design – including some of our very own work! It also includes a 6-page feature on Grain.

This is the first in a series of Grain Creative book reviews. Over the Christmas holidays, I had the time and head space to pick up a few books. The first one I read is Help!: How to Become Slightly Happier and Get a Bit More Done by Oliver Burkeman, author of This Column Will … Read more