How to Make a Moodboard: The Ultimate Creative Guide

From dreaming up a new interior design to launching a brand or business, your first step will always be to create a moodboard. But, starting with a blank slate can be tricky. Where do you even begin?

Below, we’ll cover the basics of how to make a moodboard, along with resources for moodboard inspiration, moodboard examples, and free online moodboard makers to get you started.

Let’s dive in and get that vision down!

What is a moodboard and why do I need one?

A moodboard is a collage of colors, fonts, images, and textures. It portrays your project’s creative look and feel in a way that words can’t on their own. Moodboards can help guide ongoing design decisions and even inspire future business decisions.

When done right, moodboards serve as a visual anchor. They’re a key component of your creative process. Moodboards ensure a cohesive and captivating representation of your vision and ensure everyone stays on the same page!

What to include in a moodboard

A stellar moodboard needs just the right mix of visual elements for a potent, inspiring canvas. Most moodboards will have some or all of these.

• Engaging imagery: Choose dynamic images that spark the right feelings
• Harmonious color palette: Select color combinations that mirror the mood you want
• Selective fonts: Pick font styles that amplify your project’s look
• Textures and patterns: Add these for a tactile, immersive touch
• Motivational words or phrases: Use words that nail your vision’s essence
• Symbols and icons: Opt for graphics or symbols that convey ideas efficiently
• Inspirational references: Include quotes, designs, or snippets that fuel creativity

If you can combine these and bring them to life, you’re ready to craft a moodboard that will vividly tell your project’s story.

How to make a moodboard in four easy steps

Let’s get into the key steps of making a moodboard from scratch!

1. First, start by brainstorming a theme or concept.

To start the design process, jot down the following things:

• A feeling you want your moodboard to convey
• Words you want to associate with your project
• A creative direction: fun, minimal, vintage, modern, etc.

With these notes, you’ll have a sense of direction when pulling your moodboard visuals. If you’re not sure where to start, look to other brand guideline examples!

2. Collect images that represent your vision.

Remember the good old days when you’d make a collage by cutting up magazines and gluing your favorite clippings onto a big piece of paper?

Allow yourself to get messy and think outside the box, this is creative freedom at its best! While there are no limits, here’s a list of what to add to your moodboard:

• Travel scenes
• Photography
• Personal photos that ground your values or your “why”
• Scenes from your favorite movies
• Color swatches
• Textures, or patterns
• Logos
• Architecture
• Song lyrics
• Poetry
• Quotes from books, movies, or people
• Typography
• Website and app layouts

If you’re creating a moodboard for a new brand, start to think about your brand’s fonts and logo. If you don’t already have chosen fonts for your brand identity, use the moodboard as a way to pick fonts that convey your brand’s character.

3. Curate the images and clippings you’ve collected.

Source: www.rgd.ca for Tentree

Stand back and take a look at the material you’ve pulled. At this stage, you’re looking for things that complement each other and create a sense of harmony.

At the end of the process, this is what should remain on your moodboard:

Once you begin curating, you might end up with two or even three moodboards after finding images, fonts, colors, etc. that work best with each other. This is where online moodboard makers come in handy. We’ve included some options for you in the next section!

4. Time to use your moodboard!

Now that you’ve made your moodboard and got your final design, it’ll be easier to create cohesive designs that look seamless.

You can use your moodboard to:

Remember that your moodboard isn’t set in stone, it’s a working document that can be used as a communication or collaboration tool.

Inspiration sources

Stuck in a rut? Below are some sources to inspire you. Check out our Pinterest board for fun branding ideas!

• Images: Unsplash, Getty Images, Pinterest, and Instagram.
• Fonts: Google Fonts, DaFont, Creative Market, Myfont
• Videos: YouTube, TikTok, Vimeo, Instagram
• Textures and Patterns: Texture King, Wild Textures, and Creative Market offer numerous unique textures and patterns.
• Words or Phrases: Literature, song lyrics, and motivational quotes are excellent sources for words or phrases. Look through your Spotify or Apple Music!
• Symbols and Icons: Icons8,  Noun Project, Flaticon, or the sources in the “Image” section.
• Colors: Coolors,  Adobe Color, Looka, Pinterest, Pantone
• Graphics: Behance and Dribbble are all you need for graphic design!

The best free online moodboard makers

When building your moodboard, you’ll need to choose the best tool for your design project. Some of these tools come with a variety of options, like a moodboard template!

Moodzer is a great option for everyone from performing artists to brand strategists, and especially those who are new to design. This easy-to-use web-based app allows you to upload your images and edit them directly within the platform.

InVision, an app designed for team collaboration, is another great place to build your moodboard. Especially if your team members need to comment, sketch on top of the moodboard, and easily access files.

Figma is a powerful moodboard maker that is popular among web designers for its intuitive interface. With its collaborative design, you can effortlessly create your moodboard with other team members and organize your thoughts with sticky notes and arrows.

Miro is a collaborative, digital whiteboard platform that can create anything from simple image collages to complex, structured moodboards. You can jot down ideas, add comments, and create to-do lists right next to your moodboard, keeping everything in one place.

Notion is not just a productivity app; it can also be used for creating a moodboard!! With a simplistic and clean interface, Notion helps organize your inspirations. You can insert images, videos, links, and other digital assets directly onto the page. It also has tons of moodboard templates!

Morpholio is a moodboard maker primarily for interior designers. But it has a great crossover for any creative project. Create stunning moodboards by searching and saving everything from furniture to bathroom tiles. It also includes products from top design brands!

Google Docs may seem unconventional for a moodboard maker, but it’s effective! You can easily import images, adjust their size and position, and add detailed notes. Plus, Google Docs allows multiple users to edit the document simultaneously!

Whichever method you choose to design your moodboard, whether an app or the old-school magazine way, trust your gut, and follow what feels authentic to you.

Moodboard examples for anything and everything

Looking for inspiration? Check out these killer moodboards.

Interior design moodboard

Check out the unique use of color and interior shapes to create a cohesive design aesthetic.

Fashion moodboard

Typography, glitter, and the balance of bright and black and white make this moodboard riveting and cohesive.

Branding moodboard

This board uses unified modern imagery that’s balanced by negative space and a bold pop of red. A beautiful branding moodboard example!

Consulting moodboard

This earthy, neutral color palette is a logo color trend this year, adding a soothing, tranquil look to any consulting brand.

Aesthetic moodboard

Handwritten cursive, wispy serifs, and the warm tones of autumn, this moodboard is the epitome of aesthetic. Perfect for personal branding a blog, a beauty store, or a website.

Blue moodboard example

Want to center everything around one bold color? This blue moodboard is balanced by wood-like brown and tons of crisp white colors.

Brand website moodboard

Below is a moodboard made by designers at Honey and Co Creative for a sustainably-minded lifestyle goods e-commerce shop.

Source: honeyandcocreative.com

More moodboard examples

Below is a moodboard designed to inspire this coach & content creator’s rebrand. She shared this post on Instagram as a way to celebrate the new look.

Source: @wildflowernation on Instagram

This is a moodboard designed to inspire this artist’s next collection of paintings.

Source: christinamoodie.com

Here’s a brand moodboard that was designed for an accountant who wanted to come across as approachable and warm. Keywords are included in the board to help reflect the client’s mission and values.

Source: creativewilderness.co.uk

This is an interior design moodboard. Notice how the elements are positioned to help feel the space through the moodboard

Here’s a beer delivery company’s moodboard. Doesn’t it feel like the company is a locally-grown, organic, and family-run sort of business?

Here’s a yearly vision board from Emma Rose, a popular business and lifestyle blogger. It sets her up to visualize her goals and aspirations for the year. 

Source: https://www.emmaroselondon.co.uk/

Here’s a brainstorming moodboard created by an animation and games artist when designing a new character.

Source: https://artprof.org/

Time to make your moodboard!

Congrats! You now have a totally unique visual representation of your brand. You can now bring this board with you to design meetings, social content planning sessions, and even business planning meetings.

For all logo design and branding ideas, get your inspiration from the Looka logo maker – you’ll have full creative control but with a little help from design-driven AI. 

Your moodboard is a handy new tool you can use to inform the brand decisions you make going forward, whether it’s launching a new product, planning a client’s next social campaign, or designing a new logo.