How To Create A Mood Board For Fashion Design

Mood boards

Creating a mood board is great fun and will help you be selective with the research you have gathered. This is the first stage of organizing your thoughts and collected images, enabling you to channel your creative excitement toward a cohesive and targeted design outcome. Mood boards are made by arranging images and color ideas on a large board so that you can see at a glance how your designs might evolve. They vary in their complexity but, as the name suggests, mood boards should always capture the mood or flavor of your design project, as well as reflecting your target customer.

In grouping your researched images you will have to make decisions about editing and prioritizing your selection, as well as confirming your season and color palette. Colors should reflect your chosen season— soft pastels will suggest a summer story, for example— but whatever the season, the color palette should be applied consistently throughout the project.

the project

Select a theme and a season for your work, and consider who your target customer might be. Gather together all your research material. Using a 20 x 30-in. illustration board as a base, arrange and glue together the strongest images, and combine them with a color palette or fabric swatches to make a collage. Also include images from current fashion magazines that suit your chosen theme. Build a mood board that reflects the essence of your design project.

the objective

• Prioritize images from your collated research. • Reflect your target customer and chosen season. ® Bring together creative inspiration and current fashion trends.

Finalize a color palette. • Create a mood board that summarizes your chosen design theme.

▼ Fabric swatches

If you already have ideas about the fabrics that you will use for your final designs, include swatches on your mood board. Remember to keep the presentation clean, simple, and neat.

Fashion Designing Swatches Presentation

Color samples

Paint-swatch cards can be used to help you select a harmonious group of colors for your palette. Avoid including more than eight shades in each palette or your designs may become confused and lack cohesion.

< Magazine cuttings

You should hoard a range of fashion magazines. Pick out current images that support your design ideas and include them on your mood board.

▼ Fabric swatches

If you already have ideas about the fabrics that you will use for your final designs, include swatches on your mood board. Remember to keep the presentation clean, simple, and neat.

SELF-CRITIQUE

• Have you created an easy reference tool to use when sketching your rough ideas?

• Have you reflected your season and target customer?

• Have you finalized your color palette?

• Have you used the most important images?

• Have you summarized your theme?

: Examine your chosen images together to identify the key shades and best color combinations to evoke your theme.

< Test the colors the process

Research a theme that inspires you, gathering items such as postcards, magazine images, and photographs. Selecting from this research will help you focus on what is important in the project. Combine this inspirational research with images and trend predictions from consumer and trade magazines, fashion web sites such as www.style.com, and top designers' web sites. Also gather images to reflect the season and your target customer (see pages 94 and 98).

Experience will teach you what size of board suits you best, but try starting with a 20 x 30-in. board that allows room for lots of images as well as swatches of yarns and fabrics, and any wording. Handwriting on a mood board usually looks unprofessional, so use

< Refine your choice

Lay out all your gathered research material so that you can compare the images and select which to use on your mood board.

lettering or output copy from a computer.

This is a good time to try putting together a color palette to include on your board, using paint swatches, color chips from the standard color reference books produced by Pantone, or cuttings from magazines (for more information on working with color palettes, see page 104). Avoid including images that are not appropriate for your selected colors,

V Think laterally

Research widely, linking design concepts. Here, the color and carving of an ornate picture frame is visually married to intricately embroidered fabric and a luxurious sari.

because they will detract from the overall effect.

Ensure that all the images are cut out simply and stuck down neatly. It is the images that should grab the attention and not the manner in which you have mounted them. Simplest is always best.

A Classical inspiration

The classical theme of these boards has been Inspired by the textures and forms of sculpture. A muted color palette, derived from the colors of marble, helps to evoke a timeless and restrained mood.

► Cohesive color therr

Images from fashion magazine sit happily with research materi Here, folds of fabrics in shades green create a common identit

Fashion Design Mood Board

▲ A feminine approach

This tonal palette of colors evokes a strongly feminine theme.

Summer colors

A high-summer decorative theme has been created in this mood board through an eclectic mix of colorful images. This selection could be narrowed down further still to focus on artists, florals, or decorative tile work.

► Cohesive color therr

Images from fashion magazine sit happily with research materi Here, folds of fabrics in shades green create a common identit

▲ A feminine approach

This tonal palette of colors evokes a strongly feminine theme.

A Understated sophistication

Brown and neutral tones establish a sophisticated mood.

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