Marco Spies, 2015 (2018 reprint)

Branded Interactions is a heavy, comprehensive book that dives into five phases of band-based design: discover, define, design, delivery and distribute. My personal experience is almost entirely in design & delivery as an individual contributor for small agencies. I’ve had little exposure to how a brand-focused agency goes about developing a brand and communicating it to the client.

The strength of Branded Interactions is in how Spies communicates his design thinking. The actual designs in the book are outdated - the book was published in 2015 back when iOS was skeuomorphic and Android looked like Linux. But the design thinking is still very modern and revealing for any designer who has not been exposed to comprehensive brand-thinking, research, and documentation.

Simply browsing through the book offers ideas and solutions for communicating design thinking that can be applied today. Reading the book would probably prepare you for a strong brand-based approach to communicating and delivering design at a higher level.