How to Get Great Interior Design Ideas
One of the most intriguing and fun aspects of being an interior design firm, especially in a big areas like Manchester, Cheshire and Stockport, are the opportunities we get to leverage our artistic freedom. In our opinion, artistic freedom is different from just creativity – it’s not only brainstorming the vision, but more
importantly, having the capacity to mould and execute that vision into reality.
Everybody in business these days needs creativity to really grow and sustain their competitive advantage, but with interior design, we get paid to actually bring that vision to life. Now, just because we’ve got several years of interior design experience as well as educational degrees from design schools doesn’t mean we don’t struggle with “designer’s block”. Similar to “writers block”, sometimes we run out of the creative juices needed to truly innovate and over deliver for our Manchester, Cheshire and Stockport interior design clients. Although there are certain “run-of-the-mill” interior design concepts that we try to apply for our clients, how we differentiate ourselves as a premier Manchester, Cheshire and Stockport interior design firm is by going the extra mile to truly innovate and explore new possibilities. Sometimes, our inspiration comes from other top-notch interior designers or interior design firms, interior design magazines/publications, or even just great design in other industries such as architecture. Below are some of the resources we use to get our right-brain churning (and you can use these too!):
Television – one of easiest ways to get inspired by interior design is to watch television these days. There are several shows that are focused on the step-by-step process of interior designing an entire house. When you watch these interior design programs, make sure to have a pen and pad ready to take notes. The interior designers they showcase on TV are certainly first-class in their quality and workmanship, however, pay special attention to the creative process. Although they sometimes edit this part out of the programming for time’s sake, any glimpses into their brainstorming session are pure gold. If you’re constantly on the go and simply don’t have the time to sit down for a half hour or hour, remember the lifesaving technology called DVR. To be honest, we’ve shamelessly used some amazing ideas we got from TV to astound our Manchester, Cheshire and Stockport interior design clients!
Books – although interior design is such a visual study, there is still plenty of valuable information to be gleaned from authoritative literature. Books tend to have a very well thought out plan for implementing any kind of home interior design on its pages. As an added bonus, great interior design literature usually have more than enough photos and pictures to help get a good mental picture of the process. Once in a while, we turn to books to really deliver some solid, conceptual practices to our interior design clients.
Magazines – these are our favourite kind of publications to go through. The pictures and artwork displayed here consistently inspire great interior design. Although they may never admit it, many industry-leading interior design firms collect large quantities of magazine articles and pictures and store them for inspiration and reference. One of the ways you can utilize magazines it to create a scrapbook with some of your favourite designs and articles. You could then separate them according to a specific theme or room type.
One thing to be leery of is the price tag of some of the featured interior design – the decor they show you impresses but could take a big chunk out of your bank account. Many of our more affluent Manchester, Cheshire and Stockport interior design clients prefer we show them magazines to give them a visual idea of exactly what they want to do. Although this certainly makes our interior design project simpler, they have the rare luxury of focusing only on the design and not the cost. We hope this informative post has given you some insight into not only how we get inspired to create innovative interior design for our clients, but also how you can easily do the same and be proactive when it comes to your home. There is nothing we love more than brainstorming with an interior design client who knows exactly what they want. It makes everyone’s job easier and the outcome is truly an astounding piece of art.