Helpful tools to get your design genius on

Designing a space can be fun and rewarding but also filled with anxiety and indecision.  There are so many apps and programs that offer design inspiration, paint color guidance, renovation ideas and so much more. 

Here are a few reasons why you would want to use some of our favorite (and they're free) design tools:

To get design inspiration

If you are planning to build, renovate, or remodel your home, it’s an excellent idea to gather home design inspiration. Pinterest is a great tool to gather and organize your ideas. It is like a visual bookmarking platform or search engine.  You can type different keywords into the search feature and then save these images onto boards. Follow Home Space Harmony on Pinterest here  and read more about using it as inspiration here.

Houzz is another great interior design platform that’s filled with a large database of design ideas, creative concepts and product reviews. It's focused exclusively on home renovation and design. Houzz is easy to use to browse ideas, buy products and get recommendations for local design and trade professionals. 

To plan a room layout

Although we use DesignFiles, a paid subscription service for designers, there are lots of popular, free versions of room planners. Floorplanner is one of the easiest and best-looking ways we have found to create and share interactive floor plans online. This tool allows you to draw accurate 2D plans in minutes and decorate your spaces with a large library of furnishings.

To create a design or mood board

To say we are obsessed with Canva would be an understatement.  Canva is a graphic design platform which allows you to do anything, from creating social media graphics to winning presentations and posters. We use Canva for all of our mood boards. It helps us pull together a collection of images, textures, color palettes and description words that help us envision a space. Canva has simple drag-and-drop design tools, which make pulling all these elements together easy.  Here is a great tutorial on how to create a mood board in Canva.

To visualize paint colors, wallpaper or tile

Primer is a platform that helps design enthusiasts instantly visualize products directly in their space at scale. It accesses curated brands of wallpaper, tile and paint and “shows” them up on your walls.

Two of the most popular paint manufacturers have tools to take the guesswork out of choosing paint. You can get a sneak preview of your finished project by virtually seeing the paint in your space. Benjamin Moore Color Portfolio® and Sherwin Williams ColorSnap® allow you to access fan decks and match favorite hues. It will even suggest coordinating colors and much more. In the picture below we used fabric from a client’s curtain panels to help pick out coordinating accent colors.