A while ago I wrote a series of ‘design stories’ for Cornwall Design Season. One of the companies I wrote about was Seasalt, a Cornish clothing company. I discovered that as part of their design process, they go on ‘inspiration walks’ along the coast or through the countryside to gather ideas to feed into their designs.
With no specific design requirement in mind, I thought I’d put my trust in Steve Jobs’ advice that you can only connect the dots looking backwards (something I’m doing a lot of lately) and go on one of these walks anyway.
I tried to be open to seeing things and documenting them in different ways. I found the process quite refreshing after a week tied to my desk and though I’d share some of it with you, in the hope you’d find some inspiration too.
Interestingly, it wasn’t all nature – I spotted some lovely typography (somewhat geekily, I collect photos of numbers so this was also a great one to add to the collection) and other man-made shapes and textures.
Being someone who likes to collect and order things, I soon started to spot interesting shapes…
And once home again, started to play with some of these…
Please forgive my terrible PhotoShop skills, but it was interesting to see how easily you could get from a little shape in the riverbed to a pattern of sorts. I’m sure someone more talented than me could soon turn this into a textile design.
I also tried different ways of recording things I found, like these oak leaves which I tried drawing, rubbing and using as ink stamps.
Not sure where these are going, but I liked some of the images I started making.
I tried capturing these too…
But in the end, decided only photography would really do their complexity justice.
All in all it was a wonderful way to spend and afternoon and reawakened my creativity a bit. Even if it didn’t directly result in something tangible, I’m sure it all helps to get the creativity flowing. I’d love to hear what you do for inspiration. Anyone been on a similar ‘inspiration walk’? Anyone have any other tips for getting out of a creative rut?
Further reading for the especially geeky:
- http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs
- http://www.seasaltcornwall.co.uk/blog
- http://www.southwestcoastpath.com
- here’s one I made earlier :: sketchbooks
Lovely Katie, I already feel inspired (even if I’m currently chained to my desk!). I’m interested to know what camera(s) you use – these shots are so wonderful.
Hello Rebekah… that’s fantastic!
It’s a Lumix FZ38, which is a ‘bridge’ camera – halfway between an SLR and a point and press. It’s got auto settings for landscape and close-up shots, which I used for the pics above. Nothing too fancy!
But don’t feel you need any particular equipment for this sort of walk – it’s the act of capturing the things you spot that inspires you I think, rather than the output necessarily.
Thanks so much for dropping by and leaving a comment.
Katie x
Hello Katie, I know this is a long-ago post but I’ve only just discovered your blog. So many lovely things to read! This post was just what I needed to read today: I take a lot of photos and head-clearing walks but you’ve inspired me to get out and look for those things that I’d normally ignore. And being geeky, I really appreciate the extra links…
Oh – that’s made my day. Thank you Kate!