Datagrid: Bind to custom collection, layout at design time

I am binding a datagrid to a custom collection of data objects. I will be doing
this quite often for the app I am working on, so I have a practical issue:

Are there any tricks that will allow me to configure columns in the grid at
design time? From what I can tell, this can only be done when binding to a
DataTable dropped on the form at design time. Setting all the column
characteristics in code is going to get quite tedious.