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Moodboards – Useful or Not?

Most of us have probably not used a scrapbook since childhood for such things as collecting pictures of our favorite pop stars or cute images of puppies and kittens from daily newspapers.  As an adult you have maybe kept your favorite recipes from magazines, or patterns for homemade crafts you never got round to trying!

If you are thinking of decorating a room, it maybe time to get the scrapbook out once more as they are useful to help formulate ideas and test theories out on new colour choices. The objective being to make shopping trips more worthwhile and to try and avoid those ill advised, on-a-whim purchases.

Interior designers play around with moodboards and make it all look so arty, imaginative and creative, a work of art in themselves before even getting to decorating a room!. So do they have to be that arty to help you and serve a purpose…we don’t think so.

Start by collecting clippings from magazines of either whole rooms, individual pieces or just colours or objects you like. It doesn't even have to be an object relating to the room in question, my friends bedroom colours were inspired by her 2 year olds teddy bear! Whilst out shopping, collect paint colour charts and  wallpaper samples, ask if you can have a small sample of fabric, (you may have to pay unless the shop has a few offcuts available)
Get yourself a large scrapbook, a flipchart pad or even a white board. Collect all of your samples and clippings and start to piece them together into a few different schemes. 

It's always best to start off with one piece that you want to build the rest of the room around, a wallpaper sample, a rug or your sofa that you love and will be keeping in your new room. It sounds obvious  but if it's an item that you already have - like a rug or the sofa,  take a photo of it, print the picture, and stick it to your moodboard so you can see it in context with other colours.

You may have a particular colour scheme in mind, for example cool and sophisticated creams, once your idea are all together, you will see if it has any impact, if no item, colour or texture stands out and it looks bland, try adding an accent colour, a lime green, rich chocolate or turquoise, how does it look now…better!

This is exactly what a moodboard does for you, it helps you focus and keep your ideas together, so that you don't start going over the top or keep things to cool and plain. Use it as a reminder of what you need and don't need and what colours you want to work with. It's easy to get distracted and start buying all sorts when you're redecorating, only to find it doesn't work when it's all put together. A moodboard helps you sort this process out.

Your board doesn’t have to be a work of art, tear out pictures from magazines, and forget the scissors the whole point of the board is to not take too much time making it look perfect; it is just to help you get your ideas.

If at first you don’t suceed try again, try a new accent colour, add a new texture, remove an item that overpowers the others. Don’t be afraid to try new colours, better to decide here you don’t like lime green than when it is all over 2 of your walls!

In summary, we found that moodboards were a great way of setting the scene before even picking up a paint brush and saved loads of time and money in costly mistakes. They are also useful to get the whole family involved in, ask each member of the family to come up with an idea for a shared family room, or let the kids design a moodboard for their own rooms. If nothing else, it is great  fun playing at Blue Peter-style sticking and pasting, surrounding yourself with images of your favorite things.  Whether you use all or just some of the ideas, definitely a worthwhile exercise.