Everyone’s heard of minimalism – it’s the idea that there advantages to keeping things clean, concise and as simple as possible. When applied to design, it’s produced some fantastic results.

Textures are often an underappreciated design component; here’s a quick look-through at some of the textures we’re seeing in designs right now – please do note that this is not a ranking of the “best” textures or the “most popular” or any such measure; textures are almost uniquely contextual. What’s right in one situation may be wrong in another.

A fun video from interior designer Aaron Harvey talking about what he does on a day to day basis and about some of the challenges in an interior designer’s life – for example, how do you communicate your ideas (Aaron says he collects physical imagery and texture that feels right for the “aspirations” of a project, which is a great approach). Take a look!

Last week, Inc.com posted a great article about being social in leadership positions. And truthfully, every position requires leadership to some degree – so this is useful information for everyone. We’ve shared some excerpts below.