Keeping a digital design scrapbook

Something I learned early in my career was to keep a scrapbook of items that had appealing aesthetic qualities. Many designers that inspired me often wrote they kept drawers full of items they found on the street — wrappings, packaging, photos etc. This led me to do that same, although I quickly moved in to making it a purely digital exercise — saving illustrations, screenshots of layouts, images and photos I’d taken. This was much less messy than some designer’s physical collections!

It’s been a great asset when having to quickly inspire a team of designers with a direction to explore, even if it’s just a colour palette or style. Or even to run a client through in a design workshop — and often to help with the development of moodboards.

Recently I had the chance to browse back through my collection. These images are some of the highlights I was drawn to for their aesthetic qualities. Unfortunately some of them I can’t trace back to the creator.

Photographs by Nicholas Alan Cope:

Great patterns for use as iPad, iPhone wallpapers from Simon C Page:

Coverstory illustrations from La Tigre

VM’s lovely retro compositions on DeviantArt:

Mark Weaver — a graphic designer & illustrator in the New York City area:

Unknown:

Paul Tebbott:

ISO50’s blog, often present a very similar style but also often quite inspiring:

Unknown:

Tanya Creer, some great work on SBS news: