Feeling overwhelmed by the blank canvas of your therapy sessions? Yearning to infuse your brand with a captivating visual direction? Picture this: unlocking the power of moodboarding to breathe life into your practice. What if you could craft a moodboard tailored to your ideal client’s every emotion and need? In this journey, we’ll explore how stressed art therapists can harness the art of moodboarding to create compelling visual narratives without missing a brushstroke. Ready to paint your practice with purpose? Let’s dive in.
Understanding the Power of Moodboards
I’m sure as an Art Therapist you are familiar with vision boards, right? I’m sure you do this with your own clients, help them create vision boards of their aspirations. What they want to see in the future for themselves.
This is a New Year’s activity and they start collecting pictures from catalogues and the internet and putting them together in a board of some sort. This is exactly the same thing for a brand moodboard! It’s essentially about having an idea for an art direction for your art therapy brand. Let’s just say you have all these brand attributes put together for your brand and you have an ideal client in mind. But are currently struggling to stem off of these two pieces of data.
We have to start extracting from these two pieces of data and change it into visuals that could help us define the art direction.
What is a Moodboard?
A moodboard is a board of curated images that gives us a glimpse into the future of what your art therapy brand could look like on a very simple scale without putting too much effort. This avoids jumping into starting the logo design, picking colours and fonts, etc. All those things you can start here “in rough” with building a moodboard which is just collecting images from the internet and other sources. Giving us the opportunity to start mapping out what it could actually look like from a birds eye view.
For example if I chose the attribute “calm” because it’s how I sound as an individual. I go and search for photos related to calm like blue tones, tranquil scenes. Nature brings a sense of tranquility and that’s kind of the culture I want to bring to my art therapy brand. We’ll go in more depth don’t worry! In summary, a moodboard help us get a future glimpse into our art therapy brand might look like at a very low scale, low efficiency time rate that way we can explore different vibes quickly. This avoids overthinking it’s just being intentional and intuitive.
Getting Started: Essential Tools and Materials
Materials Needed For Doing By Hand
- Magazines
- Scissors
- Glue
- Images
Digital Tools For Online Moodboarding
Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Moodboard
Step 1: Selecting Themes and Keywords
Gathering the data about your ideal client, how to do this? Create a character sheet about them, get a glimpse of their story, pain points, their needs and desires. If you want to go deeper you can capture what they say, do, see, and think in their day-to-day life. We want to look at the pains, the goals, know things that they see everyday that they enjoy.
Stay positive here, and maybe some of the things that they say they do could be attached to a desire. Look at interests, patterns, hobbies, preferences to know more about the client’s background on a psychology level.
Not only that, we need to look at the art therapy brand DNA the characteristics it holds because that’s going to play a part in moodboarding. Characteristics such as voice, culture, feeling and impact along with what makes them a unicorn. Plus analyze the ideal client’s preferences and the broader characteristics of our therapy brand to create a concrete vision.
When defining our ideal clients , preferences and aesthetic interests think about maybe some brands they like. This could be LUSH, Apple, Crayola, etc. For example, if they love nature, we might incorporate natural elements into the brand visuals. Understanding their aesthetic preferences, whether minimalist or maximalist, can guide the brand’s moodboard and graphic design choices.
Aligning the art therapy brand’s visuals with the ideal client’s expectations and preferences is the key to attraction and mutual understanding. Go into their world, look through their lens see what they see. For instance, if the ideal client prefers simplicity, you should opt for a minimalist style rather than a retro feel.
To evaluate the moodboard reach out to close clients who are your ideal client and show them the moodboards and see what visual direction they go for. Is it minimalist, retro, or another style. Getting this type of feedback makes designing a whole lot easier.
Step 2: Gathering Visual Inspirations
Next is collecting all the images according to the data. This is the fun part! I encourage you to look at multiple different sources, so I usually use Pinterest to collect my pictures and I also use Unsplash they have an interesting library of pictures you can select from. If you wanna do things by hand go for magazines, catalogues or old picture books. If you’re looking at more design focus stuff, you can use Dribbble or Behance.
Instagram is a great space too look for photos as well but pulling at different sources creates a diverse outcome of unique things to put together. Create folders to gather your inspiration on a Google Drive or on a Pinterest board (make it a secret board). Categorizing images by colours, fonts, textures, photography, shapes, graphics, stationary, symbols/icons, interior design, architecture, and more.
Here are a few if you specifically want to look for colour palettes and Fonts:
These resources help to curate a diverse collection of visuals that align with your brand’s story and your ideal client. Serving as valuable references during the design process.
Step 3: Organizing and Arranging Elements
Once you all photos are in hand and organized into folders. It’s time to create your moodboard. Start by choosing a platform to work in. Canva offers pre-made templates for easy use, while Milanote provides more flexibility in organization. If you prefer, you can go for Procreate or even create a physical board by hand. Whichever you feel drawn towards.
Start assembling your moodboard, but focus on balance. Ensure that each element relates to your brand story and connects with your ideal client. Avoid repetition and strive for variety across categories like colour, texture, fonts, imagery, and more.
Priority while putting this together think about the feeling you want your art therapy brand to express and embody. Use it as a guide for selecting and arranging your images. Look for patterns and connections to narrow down your aesthetic direction.
Lastly to end it all off, step back and assess your moodboard as a whole. Does it reflect the feelings you want to express in your art therapy brand? Does it resonate with your ideal client’s preferences, desires and needs? Keep asking these two questions while making refinements. Always remember your moodboard aligns with your brand story and speaks to your ideal client.
In conclusion,
Moodboarding is a powerful tool for guiding visual direction for art therapy brands. By curating a collection of images, textures, and themes, Art Therapists can create a visual atmosphere online and offline that enhances creativity and communication with their clients.
Throughout this guide, we’ve explored the significance of moodboards, from their role in facilitating finding the right vibe to the art therapy it’s ability to showcase the main emotions and themes visually. I’ve also provided practical tips and tools for therapists to create both physical or digital moodboards, catering to various preferences and needs.
As art therapists navigate the challenges of their profession, incorporating moodboarding into their brand building process can offer a valuable outlet for connection. This approach helps therapists create a supportive and inspiring environment for therapeutic exploration.
Embrace moodboarding as a visual storytelling tool to boost deeper connections with knowing their clients, and create brands that radiate the right feelings clients desire.