Inspiration

Here at HWM Designs we’ve gathered a few things together that might help you in your creative process. Whether you’re building against one of our designs, or creating your own design for a project, channelling your ‘inner designer’ can be difficult and frustrating. We hope the information that we’ve captured on this page will help you bring your best design ideas to fruition.

There are some basic principles around proportions. It is worth researching the Golden Ratio and the Fibonnaci sequence. Simplicity is king - less is more. For functional design, really work out what the problem is that you’re trying to design a solution for. For aesthetic products it’s useful to figure when, where, and by who, it will be viewed.

Looking across different creative industries for inspiration is always a good way to open up different ways of thinking about design.

Don’t close your mind to any forms of art, it may lead to you experimenting with different materials and techniques. Visiting art and design collections to view paintings, sculptures, furniture, pottery and textiles is always time well spent. For all kinds of links into creative arts visit the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) website.

Another stream of creativity that we love to follow at HWM Designs is the world of up-cycling and repurposing. This art form spans many domains, we particularly like to track design styles in rat rods and custom motorcycles. The ‘perfection of imperfection’ drives design in the rat rod world, check out our Pinterest design board for lots of great rat rods and custom bikes.

Exploiting the power of social media to link with fellow designers and makers is easier than ever. At HWM Designs we have a well curated Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest feeds that will connect you to a wide range of creative organisations, fellow designers and makers. Check out our feeds using the links at the bottom of this page.

Working out how to capture ideas is always time well spent. There are many very convenient apps that allow you to note ideas on the move. Two of our favourites are EverNote and Google Keep. Sketching packages like AutoDesk Sketchbook are also very useful, especially when coupled with a pen tablet, for roughing-out ideas.

The natural world simply doesn’t make design mistakes, the Golden Ratio that we mentioned earlier, can be seen in shells, flower petals, pinecones and the human body. It is always worth observing, drawing and photographing nature - it can be the greatest source of design inspiration.

Visit HWM Designs for more design ideas and digital resources for your own web or social media project.

There is nothing more satisfying than creating something new and novel - you never know where it will lead!