Using Pinterest to Mood Board a Project

Pinterest is not just a place to hoard recipes or DIY house projects you may or may not do. You can use it as a tool to create mood boards and link collections for a project. I have a Pinterest board for every project I work on. It’s great for aggregating ideas and editing them down (if you want to).

My Tips:

• Don’t just search Pinterest, their algorithm might give you ideas based on past pinning, which isn’t always a bad idea, but you want to make sure that it fits your project. You can find unique ideas in other places (i.e. Google it!)

• I look for inspiration in many different places, then I add those ideas to Pinterest via a chrome extension

• I like to look at blogs, museum websites, any kind of retail or fashion, instagram hashtags, book pages that have been scanned in. Most of the time I go to google to research my sources and then add to Pinterest from there.

• Look to a mix of references, use history and photography, sculpture and other fine art, and video

• Pin and collect as much as you can. Like, go overboard. I always get a bunch of information and then pare it down to what I am actually going to reference.

• Look for emerging patterns.

How to decide what is important on your board? You can batch edit your whole board and go through the following steps:

• Duplicates? Visually similar? Delete duplicates, keep the images you most connect with.

• Is it relevant? Keep only relevant pins.

• On the fence? Delete it.

Rearranging the pins in the board can help you view certain patterns. You can see common colors, subjects, compositions, or moods. On the whole, there’s no one perfect way to go about this. Have fun and happy pinning!