<p>Tucked into the bend of Marriner Street where the morning sun runs hot off the brick wall, Grana is an Italian-leaning espresso bar and pasticceria three blocks from the Sumner surf. The room is small and unfussed: ten tables, a four-stool bar at the till, and a sun-trap courtyard out the back where regulars head if it's clear.
Owners Ana and Pietro moved Grana up the road from its original Lyttelton site in 2022, and the shape of the place hasn't changed much since — wood-fired focaccia in the morning, fresh pasta from Wednesday, and a pasticceria case that gets restocked twice a day from the kitchen behind the counter.
Coffee is single-origin, rotated monthly, and they're tight with [Switch Espresso](https://switchespresso.co.nz) across town for green-bean supply. Cyclists get a particularly warm welcome — the bike rack out front is for customers, and there's a loyalty card reserved for riders that doesn't expire. On Sundays the courtyard fills with families from the Sumner Saturday Market the day before, mostly drawn by the pistachio cornetti they only bake once a week.
Sustainability runs through the everyday operation rather than a marketing line. Milk arrives in returnable glass bottles from a Banks Peninsula dairy, takeaway cups are gone (bring a keep cup for $1 off), and bread bags come back for a free coffee on the tenth return. The wood-fired oven is timed to off-peak power hours, and what doesn't sell by close goes to the Sumner Surf Lifesaving Club on Sunday nights.</p>