How do you create a mood board?

When having a website created, it is important to know in advance what direction you want to move in and what you like and dislike. To visually represent certain guidelines, you can create a mood board. A mood board is literally a visual representation of creative expressions. Think of ideas, styles, elements and atmospheres.

There are several free tools to create your digital mood board so let’s start there. The two options I often recommend are Canva and Adobe Express. Both urls link directly to the mood board ‘creator tool’. Of course, you can also just print pictures the old-fashioned way and stick them on a piece of cardboard. Fun for variety and it often makes you extra creative!

To come up with a mood board for your future website or brand, I have listed certain do’s and dont’s for you to help you create a great mood board:

Do’s:

• Think carefully about the purpose of your mood board and what message you want to convey. Why are you putting this together? What do you want to say?
• Go browse online for inspiration. For example, Pinterest, Dribbble and Behance are great places to get inspired and here you can also get the images you need right away.
• Don’t be limited by the online world. You can just as easily flip through magazines and cut out physical elements or photograph them with your phone.
• Deliberately make some items on the mood board slightly larger. This is about prioritizing things that appeal to you more than others.
• Collect all kinds of images, colors and fonts that fit what you want to convey.
• Hierarchy is very important when creating a mood board. Form and color take priority over content.
• Go for consistency and one style per mood board.
• Make sure you can justify why you made certain choices.
• Don’t be embarrassed if you want to make adjustments during the process. It often happens that you had a certain direction in mind and gradually want to move in a completely different direction. You can also choose to make a second mood board.

Dont’s:

• Keep the purpose of your company/brand in mind and make sure it does not become a display of personal taste.
• Don’t use too many different colors.
• Try to stay away from well-known brands because you often already have an association with them. This can trigger a certain feeling in both you and the people you present the mood board to. Of course, you don’t want people to be biased about your mood board in advance.
• It is best to give your mood board as a whole one style. Multiple mood boards to show different styles is of course no problem.

I hope these links and tips will get you started in creating a mood board that represents your desires well. Need help? Then just get in touch!