MY FAVORITE DESIGN TOOL

If I was a real designer and had a bag of tricks, this one would be at the top of my list!  I'm such a visual person, yet indecisive at times, that when I have an idea I really like to see what it might look like for real in my space.

So, enter....photo editing!  With a photo of the space I'm working with, I turn to this tool over and over again.

Last week when working on an arrangement for the artwork for my dining room, I played around on the computer before I framed one print or hammered one nail.

Trying several different arrangements really gave me a feel of the look I wanted.  Clearly this would have been going overboard...

I liked this one o.k. but it didn't add any height-everything felt short and squaty.

I finally settled on this arrangement.

Then I used painter's tape to put the prints on the wall, just to make sure I liked how it was looking in real life.

And, the final product:

Here are a few other projects that started with a mock-up photo.  Yes, these are VERY rough mock-ups, but they confirmed my plans and motivated me to proceed.

I imagined what it would be like to have a big green box in the dining room...

and what the backs of the bookshelves in the living room might look like painted in a dark color...

and what the shelves in the office would look like if I painted the backs to match the walls and left the rest stained wood...

and what my daughter's wall might look like with stripes.

I don't have Photoshop which would give more detailed results, so I use my normal editing program, Picmonkey.  If you're not familiar with it, it's an online super easy program.  There aren't specific drawing tools, but I use the "Overlays" tab on the left side and then the "Geometrics" category and choose the shapes I want to get close enough results.  Most of the features are free but there are some that require a membership.  I get along just fine without it.  Really all you need is a program that will let you play around with shapes and colors.

What's your best design tool/trick when thinking about a new space?

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