Unless you’re someone who’s been stowing away fabric samples since childhood, it can be challenging to begin your wedding planning journey. Establishing a wedding theme and gathering inspiration can be overwhelming, making it difficult for wedding planners and vendors to understand your vision.
In such instances, “[compiling] a vision board should be one of the first things you do,” according to Brides.com. Creating a wedding vision board, particularly when tailored to your budget and guest list, can streamline the planning process, enhance creative ideas, and encourage collaboration. Vision boards, though applicable to many areas like home décor or marketing, are particularly valuable for defining wedding invitation themes and color palettes.
When it comes to Ideas for your vision board, well, as you might have guessed, we have a lot of them. Read on to learn more about creating your own canvas, and why we highly recommend you do so!
What Is a Wedding Vision Board?
Your wedding vision board is an area to collect and arrange any design influences or inspirational material you come across. This could be a physical space – a literal bulletin board or foam board on which you hang magazine clippings and staple fabric swatches. Many couples like the tactile element of flipping through pages and pushing in thumbtacks. Or it could be a digital collection, where you use Instagram to gather ideas and create Pinterest boards to represent your ceremony, reception décor, dress, and stationery suite!
Initially, you can fill up your vision board by grabbing pieces pretty indiscriminately! Browse bridal brochures and cut out any scenes or details that catch your eye. Snap up any postcards, napkins, or coasters that might set the cogs whirring in your head. And raid your own house for any color pairings you’ve always liked or photos you’ve always admired! You can later refine your collection, identify patterns, and remove items for a more curated display.
What Can a Wedding Vision Board Help You With?
Now that the format of your board has been determined, you can devote sections of it to resolving individual decisions. For example, font plays an important role in dictating the mood and style of your wedding – from Save the Dates to table cards, the typeface will be prominent. If you’re attracted to regal serifs, then stockpile any instances where you see them in use – bookmark that website or screenshot that page. Should you receive mail from any other engaged couples, take note of what font families feature in their invitations.
Colors are probably the easiest (and most fun) element to think about with your vision board! The palette you choose will extend from your RSVP cards to your centerpieces, so start by picking up some old-school color charts and collating your favorite pairings. The Knot also points out that “wedding décor trends often stem from whatever is in vogue in the interior design world.” Head to a home improvement store and see what wallpaper samples or furnishings resonate the most with you. Then whittle down the frontrunners on your vision board!
Other Benefits of a Wedding Vision Board
If you’re still not sold on the concept of a wedding vision board, perhaps the following list will do it justice! Here are some of the reasons wedding vision boards have become so popular in recent years.
Collaboration
Think of your vision board as a ‘Show and Tell’ for your wedding plans – a powerful tool for communicating your ideas to planners and vendors. Having visual aids to hand is essential when you’re trying to convey something abstract – a particular mood, emotion, or tone. If you’ve been keeping a digital scrapbook or manifestation board, simply share the link with any interested parties, ensuring everyone is on the same [web]page.
Motivation
Wedding planning is a lengthy process and usually takes a couple of years. Throughout that time, it’s natural to experience ‘decision fatigue’: where your ability to make good decisions eventually diminishes. However, if you have images of that dream wedding on your vision board – guiding your decisions and demonstrating what you’re working towards – then the planning becomes a lot easier. Can’t remember whether the seating chart was meant to be burnt orange or sage green? Refer to your board, and trust your judgments thus far!
It can also be very refreshing to spend time meditatively experimenting with your vision board. If you feel you’ve lost your way, go back to basics, and have some fun simply admiring themes and coordinating colors.
Visualization
One of the main reasons that people create vision boards for other aspects of their life is to pursue manifestation: “a self-development practice in which you envision – and ideally bring about – a desired outcome.” Think of the quote normally attributed to Walt Disney: “If you can dream it, you can do it.” The point has been made countless times, but the sentiment remains the same: that visualizing something is a big part of achieving it.
Dreaming of a particular wedding venue that seems out of your price range? Sneak it onto your vision board just in case. Aiming for a summer date that would sync perfectly with everyone’s calendars? Stick it up in bold text on your board, and see what happens! By honing in on your intentions and proclaiming them to the universe, the law of attraction will hopefully help the stars to align.
Now that you know what a wedding vision board is, all that’s left to do is to create one and populate it – whether that’s via an app on your phone or a tangible poster board. To assist you in that process (and get the creative juices flowing), take a look at our recent articles on 2025 wedding trends: “2025 Trending Wedding Themes to Get Excited For” and “2025’s Top Wedding Color Schemes and Personalized Product Trends Revealed.”
Eoin is a Content Specialist at Zazzle in Cork. He’s recently bought a house with his fiancée, and thus most of his time these days is spent trying to keep the walls from caving in and the wolves from the door. Still, he’s always open to book, game, and movie recommendations, so if you have some, let him know: he’ll add them to a very, very long list.
