Buy A Mood Board

Mood boards can also save you time later in the process as you put your idea into action by ensuring that everyone is on the same page. They can help you illustrate your ideas to others who may be helping you along the process, from interior decorators to those drafting up promotional material.

buy a mood board

Now, I know some interior designers create physical mood boards. But honestly, we never do. The one time I took an entire tray of physical samples to a clients house they were so confused. Which fabric went where? What would the colour actually look like when applied to an entire sofa? How would the pieces really look side by side? The list of questions went on and on.

When I started posting on Instagram two years ago, I had never considered doing a mood board when planning my home decorating projects. I'm not an interior designer and for me, the idea felt simply out of my league. I was quite happy pinning away on Pinterest - I realised the other day that prior to the Instagram explosion, this was how I spent most of my evenings, thus why I have over 6,000 pins and barely any updates for the last 18 months. I still pin like a crazy woman when I have a project on the go, but have stopped using it for general inspo, or 'fun', I suppose, as Instagram seems to tick all those boxes. Before Pinterest, I was a magazine addict - my hallway is currently home to ten years worth of Livingetc and Elle Decoration with lots of empty pages from which I religiously cut pictures and thrust into plastic folders, one for every room. Ah, the old days.

Last week, I published a blog post showing my plans for the hall, stairs and landing. I pulled all my ideas together, as I now do for every room, on a digital mood board and received lots of questions asking how I did it. Before I answer that, the big question must be WHY I do it. There are two parts to this answer. Firstly, it clarifies your random ideas and arranges them clear and concisely so that you have a template from which to work. And secondly, in a house that contains five people of which I am only one (the only one who ever does anything, let's be honest), it's a brilliant way of presenting your ideas and getting buy in from everyone else.

Firstly, ignore them. My husband works in the car industry. I work in interiors. I don't tell him how to undercut a chassis (I have no idea what that means) so therefore I don't allow him to tell me whether he'd like Pavillion Grey or Strong White in the kitchen. Simple. Secondly, mood board the hell out of it. Stick it all together on a sheet, make it look good, make it look cool and professional, show them how amazing it will all look when it's done. Wave it in front of their faces, present it as a fait accompli. They will be so overwhelmed by your creativity and fabulous ideas that they will be mood boarded into submission. Job done.

Okay, I'm being a little bit tongue in cheek (only a little bit) but from personal experience, mood boarding is always a winner. When I was planning my son's rooms (aged 14 and eight), it was hard to get my head around what they wanted in a way that also incorporated what I wanted for their rooms. For both rooms, their ideas were at the other end of the spectrum to my own. Max wanted a 55 inch TV and multi coloured LED's on constant flash so that he could play Call Of Duty or FIFA18 on repeat, whilst residing in a room that was basically a cave. My plan was to go with the walls but to stealthily sneak in artwork, nice bedding and - gasp - plants. I mood boarded it, he agreed and the job was done.

Leo's initial insistence was that he wanted a full wall of graffiti and astro turf carpet. I mood boarded with alternative (ie, completely different) ideas but included products in bright colours, wallpaper that complimented these shades, cool artwork and neons. He loved it. Neither Max nor Leo really knew what they wanted - they had an idea of the impact that they wanted in their rooms and as a result, their initial ideas were way too extreme. The mood boards created the same wow effect but in a much more subtle way. Win win.

So how do you create a mood board? As I said at the start, I'm not an interior designer but over my many years of obsessional decorating projects, I've styled and planned my rooms by going through the following process. This is what I do.

This is categorically the best way to start. Pinterest is the ideal way to find out your ultimate core style and what you really, really want to achieve. I set up a new board in the name of the room I'm planning and get pinning. And I keep pinning until I start repinning the same pins (which always happens). The more I pin, the more I get a real feeling for what I want to achieve in the room.

Don't just stick to room shots - I pin lighting, fabrics, wallpapers, the whole lot. Find the paint colour that you like and search for it - for example, searching on Strong White will bring up lots of lovely circular paint splodges that are ideal for the purpose. Upload photographs of products you think would fit and add them too. If you can, find pictures which have a white background. You'll end up with a board of inspiration that's a great starting point.

So there's plenty of mood board stylie applications you can use. I use Canva.com which is ideal for the purpose. It's a free design application from which you can create anything you like - banners, flyers, resumes, media kits. It's got it all and it's really simple to use.

For your mood board, you don't want to use any of these so look again at the menu on the left hand side and click Uploads. From here, you can upload your own photographs. Upload all the photographs that you have carefully curated from Pinterest and they will then appear in the left hand block, ready to go.

To add a picture to your mood board, click on it. It will immediately appear in the centre of your screen. If you are happy with the picture in it's entirety, you can adjust the size by using the edges. If you want to crop the picture, double click on this photograph and it will give you a crop border that you can move around and extend. Extend it to the perfect crop and press the Return key.

I tend to crop all my photographs, particularly individual items, to make them as compact as possible for the mood board. This is the reason why I mentioned earlier that it's better to find accessory photographs which are on a white background - easily to chop out.

You've got all your photos in place, now you want to add in the detail. Go to the left hand side bar and click Elements. This will give you a great selection of extras that you can add to your mood board. Go to the top and search. I use arrows on my board but it's got loads of fun stuff. All the basic stuff is free but you can pay if you want something super flash. Click and they will appear on your presentation.

I put the name of the mood board on the top right hand side (I like a bit of right margin justification - OCD issues). I use mini header words to add substance to the board - for example, 'metallic lighting' - and then move the arrows around to point in the right direction. Easy peasy.

Finished? Go to the top margin where it says Presentation - Untitled Design and click - you can change the name to suit your mood board. Then click on the tab next to this - Download - and it will ask you how you want to save it. I usually save twice, both as a PDF and as a JPG.

Now all that's left to do is to present your ideas to your family and watch them gasp in awe and provide immediate agreement to whatever plans you are intending to undertake. Jokes. They'll still moan. But I can honestly say that when I create a mood board, it really does get my head around what I'm intending to do and also ensures that everyone in my family knows what is going to happen and is as happy with the project as they could be.

By whittling down your ideas into a single sheet, it gives you an overview of what you need to do and helps you decide how you are going to do it. In the case of the boys bedrooms, it enabled us to blend our ideas into something that was acceptable to us both. Well, mostly me. Let's not get carried away here. They're only 14 and eight, they don't actually KNOW cohesively how their ideas will work in their rooms. But I can categorically say that I was more likely to gain their agreement by presenting it to them as the whole shebang than I would have done otherwise. And let's face it, the idea of a graffiti wall and an astro turf carpet is enough to push anyone over the edge. Happy mood boarding!

Adobe Illustrator is the app of choice for mood boards. However, I use many programs in the Adobe Suite. In addition to Illustrator, Photoshop, and InDesign, I recently created my first YouTube videos using Adobe Premiere Rush, made specifically for social media video, and I'm a big fan.

Canva also has a subscription Pro optionwith plenty of bells and whistles for about $10/month that includes a super easy tool for removing the backgrounds from your images (trust me, this is important) that other designers I know swear by. If you mostly want to create mood boards and social media templates, Canva is a great way to go.

The New Year is one of the best times of the year to set fitness and wellness resolutions. And one of the best ways to ensure you keep those fitness and wellness resolutions all year long? A mood board.

Mood boards can be a great source of inspiration for making healthier decisions and moving towards your fitness and wellness goals. But what, exactly, is a mood board, how do they work, and how can you use mood boards to become the happiest, healthiest version of yourself in 2023 (and beyond)?

Sometimes called a vision board, a mood board is a collection of images, graphics, words, and other visual imagery collaged together. They essentially create a visual representation of a chosen topic, idea, concept, or goal. 041b061a72