Using Pinterest as a thought/ mood board when designing new products

When I am creating a new piece for my shop I often sit and make a 'thoughts board' or inspiration board. I do this in different ways. Sometimes I make a collage from magazines, sometimes I take lots of photos, sometimes I will save links and often I will look to place like Pinterest.

With the photographs, I take my iPhone everywhere I go so when I find something I like I take a photograph of it. Often the photograph will then sit on my computer for a long time before it gets worked into an idea and I will keep looking back on photographs to spark new ideas. I quite often use photographs for colour inspiration and it helps me look at what colours work together.

Recently, I have been turning to Pinterest more as a way to gain inspiration. I can combine my photographs, notes, collages etc with what I find on Pinterest and come up with lots of new ideas.

For example, I have been collecting colour inspiration photographs on my Pinterest board for a while and when I was making my new 'Wool Ball' necklaces I looked back through the board for inspiration for the colour schemes.


I knew I wanted to make a necklace in more muted tones and particularly colours drawn from nature. I particularly liked the combination of brown with the pink and green which was shown at the top of this pile of linen and I used these colours as a basis when making one of my wool ball necklaces which you can see here...

So, for me, Pinterest is not just a fun platform to play on and somewhere where I can show my work but also a place in which I can create digital thought boards which help inspire my work.

Another example of a 'digital thought board' which I put together on Pinterest was my Space board. I have always been fascinated by space so put together this board just because it is something I love rather than looking at is as something that might in the future inspire me. I was then flicking through my different boards and came across my space board again and decided I wanted to try and make a space themed necklace

Follow The Dorothy Days's board Space - Moon, stars, galaxies, astronomy and planets on Pinterest.

Galaxy bead necklace 

This galaxy bead necklace is what I then came up with. I hope you like it and that this post has shown you more about my creative process and how I come up with ideas.

Both my wool ball and galaxy necklace are available to purchase in my shop

Please find my wool ball necklace HERE  and my galaxy bead necklace HERE 

Hope you enjoyed reading this

The Dorothy Days X