Graphite Design Studio · Est. 2012Booking April 2026
Essays, process and the odd opinion — written by the people who do the work.
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Templates feel fast until they aren’t. Here is how a two-hour blank-page session — sticky notes, one wall, no laptops — saves us three weeks of rework later, and why clients who join it end up with a sharper brief than the one they came with.
Our performance budget, line by line: what we cut, what we keep, and why 1.1 seconds is the number we design around from day one — with the real before-and-after numbers from six launches and the three tricks that did most of the work.
How we quote, what the ±10% really covers, and the three times it went wrong — including the store that doubled in scope halfway through, what we charged for it, and the rule we wrote afterwards so it never surprises anyone again.
Twelve weeks, one 3D configurator and a checkout that went from seven steps to three. The decisions that moved average order value by 38%, the ideas we threw away, and what the founder told us on the Thursday we launched.
It is a constraint. Notes on contrast ratios, paper-like texture, how many greys a dark theme really needs, and the one accent colour we keep in a drawer and never use — because the work looks better without it.
Sanity, WordPress or something headless? A plain answer, based on who actually edits the site on a Tuesday afternoon, how often they do it, and how much they are willing to learn before they give up and email us instead.
Why every client sees real work every Thursday, how we keep the reviews to thirty minutes, and what happens on the weeks when we honestly have nothing to show — spoiler: we say so, and explain why.
A brand refresh, a calmer site and a subscription that runs itself. How a small roaster tripled online orders in a quarter without a single paid ad, and the two-line change on the product page that did more than the redesign.
Five questions, one page. What you are building, who it is for, when it has to be live, what success looks like and roughly what you can spend — everything else we can find out together on the first call.
If an animation doesn’t explain something, it waits for a better idea. Our rules for motion on the web: durations, easing, when to use 3D, how to respect reduced motion, and the three micro-interactions we reuse on almost every site.
Keyboard first, screen reader second, and why we test every release with our eyes closed. The checklist we start with, the bugs it never catches, and how accessible sites turned out to convert better, too.
Small teams, clear prices, work every week. The rest is detail. A short letter on what fourteen years and a hundred and forty launches taught us, and the few things we would still do differently.
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