Financial uncertainty is a ticking time bomb for businesses. Unless you have a full view of what goes in and out of your account, you're blind to your business's full potential.

Fortunately, there is a tool that accurately predicts your business' 'future cash' without needing to be a financial whiz—a financial forecasting tool. Financial forecasting tools convert what-ifs into facts. You integrate your business data, declare your goals, view future projections of your finances, and fill in the gaps right before it causes damage. No more struggling with surprise losses and missing opportunities that you could've taken yesterday.

Here are five of the best financial forecasting apps to keep you on top of your finances.

Cushion

Made For: the future-focused freelancer

Made by freelancers—for freelancers. As a freelancer, you almost never know what's next. Schedules are all over the place, income rises and fluctuates, and stability seems out of reach—but not anymore. Cushion was built to take the stress out of freelancing by providing optimised financial insight with a birds-eye view of your schedule, potential income, and expenses. Better decisions, and no more overbooking!

Causal

Made For: the visual learner

Struggling with building financial models in Excel? Instead, build one in minutes on Causal! Trusted by hundreds of rapidly-growing teams, Causal takes away the hassle in financial modelling. With auto-managed driver-based projections, Casual projects your business' financial capabilities from one week to 10 years—even better, it shows you exactly how to get there.

Float

Made For: the multitasker

Keep your business afloat with Float! Decision-making doesn't have to be as nerve-wracking as it is for you right now. With a real-time, visual forecast of your coming cash flow, even newbies can feel more confident about their next steps. With Float, you don't just enjoy a clear and precise view of how your finances are running, but the forecast is also automatically synced on your account. This way, you can always track what goes in and out of your business, and what's about to come!

Pulse

Made For: the emerging entrepreneur

Thinking twice about making an investment? Let Pulse check. Small businesses are easily intimidated by huge investments—understandably. Without a financial forecasting aid, you're at a dead end on how this decision will affect your business. Pulse is a master in this aspect—scenario testing. On the app, you can toggle income and expenses on and off and see how certain decisions affect your operations. Additionally, you can add in your cash flow projections, including expected growth and expense curves. This gives you a clear view of when and how much you can spend in one sitting. The best part? Pulse is easy to set up and understand!

PlanGuru

Made For: the strategic businessman

When it comes to flexibility, PlanGuru has 20 versatile forecasting methods that you can explore. It projects finances for up to 10 years and includes significant turn-key methods, custom business drivers, and non-financial data analysis. With PlanGuru's unlimited budget flexibility, forecasts can go as simple or as complex as you want and need. Furthermore, the app provides powerful insights into which methods work best for your business, helping you make even better decisions in the future!

Wedding and Event Styling is a competitive creative industry—in order to stand out, you need to build a strong brand and, crucially, get in front of your target market. One of the best methods of reaching your ideal client? PR—and lots of it!

Getting publicity (without hiring a publicist) can be difficult if you do not know where to look, especially for upcoming wedding and event stylists. But it is entirely possible to land fantastic PR opportunities from trusted and reliable sources, whether you're just starting out or you're an established name in the world of wedding and event planning. So, can wedding and event stylists find PR opportunities? To make your search easier, we've rounded up all the sites you should have on your radar to land your next publicity opportunity—get searching!

HARO

HARO, short for Help a Reporter Out, is a platform where journalists and creative professionals can directly connect. The best part? HARO is a go-to source for journalists from on-trend and reputable outlets, such as Refinery29 and Mashable—both of which produce great content covering the Wedding and Events industry. Switch on your email alerts for a 3 x daily dose of PR requests specifically picked out for you. Check your inbox promptly throughout the day and always be sure to send your pitch within the deadline.

Tip: make your pitch irresistible by thoroughly reading briefs and complying with journalists' requests to a T.

Twitter

Getting the attention of a reputable journalist can be challenging, especially for newcomers. Fortunately, Twitter facilitates lots of interactions between creatives and journalists. Search the hashtags #journorequest to find PR opportunities. Go a step further and use hashtags connected to your industry too, such as #wedding, #weddingstylist, and #weddingplanner, to filter the right requests for you. As soon as you click enter, voilà! Recent tweets from journalists will appear, looking to connect with wedding and event professionals just like you! Got a story to tell? Take matters into your own hands and pitch your story followed by the hashtag to let journalists find you.

Instagram

Instagram is another example of how you can use social media to source PR opportunities. Odds are, you're already using Instagram to showcase your work and grow your online presence—so this is a great chance to multitask! Follow journalists and publications that you aspire to work with to be notified of their opportunities. Alternatively, you can tag accounts in your content for a chance to be reposted to their page—@wedphotoinspiration and  @inspiredbythis are great places to start.

Qwoted

Qwoted is cleverly capitalising on advanced tech and AI to revolutionise the traditional media market. They're specifically committed to connecting smaller brands with a variety of media outlets, making it the perfect place to start if you're a wedding professional new to the PR game. Qwoted ensures that you only receive requests from reputable channels, such as Forbes and HuffPost. Even better, a journalist's publication is always shown on their profile so you know exactly what you're applying to before you send your pitch.

As an interior designer, you know how to make a house a home. With more people wanting virtual services, you might wonder how to use your skills in virtual interior design.

Many virtual interior design platforms can help you start your remote interior design career.

Working virtually removes location limits. You can reach more clients and spark your creativity. Digital work lets you test new ideas without breaking the budget.

This article will explore:

• The rise of virtual interior design services and platforms.
• How interior designers can leverage these platforms to expand their clientele.
• Key tools and software available to enhance remote interior design capabilities.

Ready to explore virtual interior design? Join these platforms now...

Stucco

Stucco's users have one goal: to find the perfect interior designer for their project.

Stucco offers virtual interior designers a chance to grow their client base. They hire designers for remote, project-specific work. Just fill out their online application.

While you wait, browse Stucco for interior design inspiration.

Stand-out feature: virtual furniture store

You know that feeling when you enter a furniture shop—the sheer excitement at all the possible ways you could incorporate the pieces into your designs.

Stucco creates that excitement with a virtual furniture shop. Interior designers can find products from brands like Anthropologie and West Elm.

My Bespoke Room

Houzz awarded Bespoke as the "Top Rated Interior Design Service 2022"—and it is well-deserved.

The Bespoke team has skilled and experienced interior designers. Bespoke excels in spatial and lighting designs—great for your CV as a virtual interior designer.

As a team member, you'll design both commercial and home interiors—a great way to broaden your skills.

Stand-out feature: search by specialisation

The Bespoke team consults and supports clients from the initial design stage to final concept.

As a Bespoke designer, you can list your specialities. Clients can search for your skills and see you are the perfect match!

Havenly

Havenly is known as the go-to site for clients seeking virtual interior design services. This means lots of exposure for you as a designer.

Havenly's slogan is "making room for better living." If this resonates with you, consider joining their team.

Stand-out feature: customised profile

Havenly showcases their designers, each with a custom profile highlighting their personality, style, and expertise.

This is excellent news for you as a designer; your ideal client can find you effortlessly!

Decorilla

Decorilla offers a straightforward sign-up process for its virtual design service platform.

It's ideal for designers new to virtual interior design, allowing them to build their portfolio and earn money doing so —Decorilla charges only a small commission from clients!

Stand-out feature: 3D room designs

Impress your clients with Decorilla's 3D room designs. 3D renders help you showcase your vision and guide clients in visualizing their dream space.

Wouldn't you love to sit down with a social media marketing expert and pick their brain about all things Instagram? Where do I start with analytics? How do I differentiate my brand? And the golden question: how do I turn followers into paying clients? Emanuela Schneider is here to answer your prayers. Emanuela Schneider is a social media manager for interior designers, architects and luxury home decor brands but her expertise can be applied to creative entrepreneurs and freelancers in any industry.

We invited the Visualist community to an access-all-areas chat with Emanuela—an opportunity for creatives just like you to ask their most niggling questions about Instagram and beyond! In case you missed it—here are the highlights...

I want to start taking social media seriously. Where do I start?

Start by planning your first 9 posts! I work with a 4-pillar content strategy: Educational (show your authority), Personal (showcase yourself), Objectional (why should someone hire you) and Inspirational. Your first posts should be a mixture of the above content pillars using your project photos, photos of yourself and even images you find inspirational. Also, remember to add location tags!

What tool should I use to track my analytics?

For analytics tracking: Facebook business suite—you can track years of analytics over there! I'd recommend tracking your analytics every month, especially now that Instagram changes the algorithm so often.

How can I check in with what the algorithm is favouring from time to time?

It's normally very clear once the algorithm updates because a strategy that was working wonders (getting reach and resulting in website clicks) suddenly yields nothing. For example, Reels used to be the best way to increase reach but since Instagram rebalanced the algorithm, still photos and carousels tend to do better. For definitive answers, keep track of articles on social media and, if in any doubt, head to Adam Mosseri's page. He's the head of Instagram and is very very upfront about what Instagram is up to.

Instagram is so saturated in the interior design space, how can I differentiate myself/my brand?

Think about your ideal client and what they want. While there are many designers in your local area who can create beautiful projects, what's your selling point? Hiring someone to work in your home is a very personal, and sometimes stressful, process. The decision normally comes down to how well a client connects with your brand voice. Your client needs to trust you, so always focus on showing your expertise and your personality.

Secondly, have you thought about expanding elsewhere? If you're only on Pinterest to organise your client process, you're missing out! You can start using Pinterest strategically by creating pins with your ideal keywords. Pinterest is a go-to platform for home buyers looking to renovate—89% of users there are looking to make a purchase decision and almost 40% of them plan on getting their ideal home within the next five years. Also, being active on Pinterest actually helps to boost your "Google Juice" since it's a search engine platform. When local clients do research on designers in their area, they'll find your website!

How can I find a balance between being personal and professional on Instagram?

First, you need to think about your brand voice—you never want to be too serious to the point where people feel intimidated to reach out. That's why I always suggest having a Personal content pillar, the Personal pillar exists to allow people to connect with the person behind the brand. A great example of Personal content: posting a picture of you and your team members and adding fun facts and caption with a call to action, asking your audience to comment fun facts about themselves for example.

Calls to action are the best way to convert followers into clients. Use a mixture of fun CTAs as above and actionable ones such as signing up for your newsletter or booking a call at your link in bio. Stories are also a great tool for creating Personal content. Take your audience through your day, be yourself, and post fun polls—have some fun! Ideally, you want to be sharing something personal and real, whilst establishing a connection to your ideal clients. Figure out what makes you relatable and share that with your audience.

How often do I need to post on Instagram—is it true the more often the better?

It's not true. The key is consistency. If you can post every day consistently using a real strategy and great content pillars, you will grow faster than someone who posts only twice a week. Even if you don't have much content to work with or much time, being consistent will already make a huge difference.

It is hard to balance the upkeep of my business with the upkeep of social media. At what stage should I consider hiring a social media expert?

In my opinion, it's all about time and priorities. If you have a good understanding of your marketing strategy and have the time and resources to dedicate to social media then I recommend keeping social media marketing in-house. However, if you don't have much time in your day and you're not entirely sure about your marketing strategy then it is worth hiring externally. A good solution could be to hire a professional to spruce up your social media strategy each month, but you still do the actual content creation and posting yourself.

Any tips on turning gifted collaborations into paid collaborations?

Use gifted collaborations as social proof. After that, use your analytics from these collabs to craft your pitch for a paid collab. The most difficult part is getting started—it is all about making the first move with your ideal brands!

PSA: When it comes to collaborations, know your boundaries. When they stop being a benefit to you, stop.

How do I find my target market on Instagram? And then... how do I get them to follow me?

Initially, it's all about hashtags. Next, you need to be visible where your ideal clients are—that way they'll see you and keep you in mind. Think local. Where do your ideal clients frequent? Do they interact with local industry partners? Any local independent shops? A great route is to engage with these local businesses and create a referral relationship. Don't be afraid to follow and connect—hang around their pages and comment on their posts.

When it comes to followers, it's all about engagement. Increase your comments on others' posts, reply to stories, and reply to your own comments. The more you engage, the more reach your posts will have and the more people engage back. Remember: your number of followers doesn't actually benefit the algorithm, it's all about the number of people who engage with your account. I know it can be tempting to buy followers to look "more authentic" but in the long run, it will only harm your account. If your followers are made up of ideal clients and industry partners, your posts will actually make a difference! If they're bought followers, your posts will reach people who have no interest in your service or brand—so Instagram becomes a waste of time!

So... basically, making connections as you would in real life is just as effective on social media?

Exactly! Some people forget to be "social" on social media. But that is the key.
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Visualist regularly invites industry experts to answer the practical questions of our creative community. Brand messaging, financial management, legal contracts—you name it! Secure an invite to our next event by joining us on Facebook.

As an interior designer, creating comes naturally to you. Finances—maybe not so much! But being an interior design entrepreneur means being smart about money. Thankfully, there are plenty of industry professionals willing to give out solid advice to small business owners just like you.

Running your own business, you're likely always on the go—so we've found a way to incorporate financial education into your busy schedule: podcasts. You just have to sit back, plug in your earphones, and hit play!

Tune in to the best financial podcasts for interior design entrepreneurs—volume up!

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The Interior Collective

Hosted by: IDCO Studio

Recommended for: the new entrepreneur

When it comes to advice, you're in safe hands with The Interior Collective. This podcast provides actionable tips from highly-skilled professionals and will help you grow your interior design business FAST.

Standout episode: Financial Planning for Interior Designers with Brittney Vier. A power hour covering all the basics of money management for interior designers including managing payroll and taxes.

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The Profit is a Choice Podcast

Hosted by: Michele Williams

Recommended for: the profit chaser

For money-making tips, The Profit is a Choice Podcast sets the standard. Michele Williams is a qualified strategic finance coach, dedicated to sharing her knowledge with interior designers. Michele explores all sorts of topics that will benefit your business such as industry challenges, finance, marketing, systems and strategies.

Standout episode: Reviewing your Profit First Strategy. Have you created a Profit First strategy and implemented it – then left it alone? Let's change that!

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The Interior Design Business Podcast

Hosted by: Wingnut Social

Recommended for: the strategic designer

Dedicated to making the lives of interior designers better, The Interior Design Business Podcast is laser-focused on discussing efficient marketing strategies and exploring the latest technologies in the interior industry. Founded by Darla Powell, an interior designer herself, you can rest assured that everything you hear on this podcast is made for your success.

Standout episode: How to Ask Your Interior Design Clients for Their Budget. Been struggling with client budgeting? Not anymore.

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The Affluent Creative

Hosted by: Melissa Galt

Recommended for: the super planner

As a business owner, every decision you make comes at a cost—from hiring to the design proper. The Affluent Creative explores sustainable ways to build your interior design business and avoid loss. With over 3 decades of interior design history, Melissa Galt is here to help you earn more —in less time and with less stress. Topics covered include hiring locally, securing clients, and increasing profit margins.

Standout episode: Never Worry About Money Again When You Learn to Fuel the Soul of Your Business. This a well-needed reminder of how much you and your brand are worth!

At the end of last year, we hosted a community gathering—an intimate soirée set against a fittingly autumnal backdrop. To bring the seasonal setting to life, we partnered with, a friend of Visualist and founder of fourteen a.m., Winnie Tam. To embark on our collaborative project, we needed a space to house our inspiration, develop our concept, and seamlessly collaborate—naturally, we used Visualist.

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A shared space to develop ideas

“We want to transform the space by turning foraged natural materials into art” - Winnie Tam

Given the seasonal timing and her personal appreciation for nature, Winnie suggested that we let Autumn's natural beauty inform our design direction—deep red hues with sparks of yellow, intricately tangled branches and delicate but robust autumn bloomers. The only place to find items of such beauty is in nature itself, and so our decor was to be built entirely from foraged natural materials.

We named our event, "The Art of Gathering"—a title that spoke to the creative concept as well as the physical act of bringing together our creative community.

Choosing a plot

To manage the project, we needed a "control room". We built a hub in Visualist as an easily navigable space to store our growing ideas.

Hunting and gathering

Winnie and our creative team set about foraging for inspiration to fill our hub. Firstly, we looked for images that broadly communicated our desired aesthetic and sparked imagination—each image was saved to our Visualist library. The library was then combed for top picks and these were clipped to the board "evening Inspiration".

We then repeated this process with boards dedicated to food styling and invitation design. We also created boards to detail more logistical aspects of the project such as the existing furniture within the office and the assets of our brand partners—this systematic and logical organisation of our ideas was key to the success of our event.

A pop of colour

Winnie used the gathered imagery to craft our colour palette for the event. Our colour palette needed to be recognisably autumnal, without being too conventional.

Winnie started with an auto-generated colour palette taken from an image in the Art of Gathering inspo board, she then used Visualist's colour palette editor to explore hues, tints and shades. The resulting colour palette felt reminiscent of autumn but with a distinctly customised stamp—exactly what we wanted.

Watering the seeds

Visualist is not just a space to store and share inspiration, it is also a space to collaborate; to discuss and refine every detail of a project. The key to a successful collaboration is clear communication, we tackled this with stickies. Leaving stickies on our visual references ensured all opinions were heard but also kept our conversations focused and concise.

When working with visual references, it is useful to pinpoint specific elements of an image such as colour, texture or subject to ensure everyone is clear on the project the direction is heading. Our method of stickie correspondence meant fewer revisions were required to the final design—given our limited time scale, this efficiency was key.

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A platform to facilitate collaboration

Establishing a clear vision amongst ourselves was one thing, but in order for the event to come together we needed to clearly and efficiently communicate that to our brand collaborators. We bookmarked the websites of homeware and lifestyle brands that we felt matched our brand aesthetic in our Art of Gathering Hub, then set about proposing a collaboration with them. In our initial outreach, we attached a set to convey the mood, colour scheme and delicateness that we wanted to emulate at our event—after all, a moodboard speaks a thousand words.

The best part? Sets made in Visualist can be shared directly with just one click—recipients don't need a Visualist account, which meant there was no barrier to viewing—an important factor in the high success rate of our outreach. Here is what we shared...

Our set was coherent and clearly communicated our vision, which made the rest of the process simple and efficient—our brand partners required very little help with shortlisting products they felt were suitable for our event.

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A home from concept to completion

Winnie married all the elements of her design in a set in Visualist. The infinite canvas mimicked a table on which she could lay out all her tablescape ideas and play with potential arrangements. Here, Winnie could illustrate exactly how she envisioned each aspect of the design entwining and we began to see the vision come to life. Winnie's final sets detailed furniture layout, the function of each space and the particulars of the decor—down to the finest of details—which were then shared with the entire Visualist team ahead of the big day. The detailed preparation and clear references meant that when that the set-up ran as a fine-tuned operation. Every box checked, everything in order—not a leaf out of place!

Et voila! A beautiful event brought to life in Visualist!

What defines a creative visionary? What is that spark that elevates their creativity to a new level? Perhaps the answer lies in a series of unconventional habits. Dali took systematic naps to awaken his creativity and Karl Lagerfeld had an infamous army of iPods, iPads and iPhones! Each creative mind has its own set of quirks, idiosyncrasies, and fascinating habits. From the way they conceptualise ideas to the way they execute their projects, the quirks of creatives make their art truly one of a kind. Let's explore the weird and wonderful habits of a few of history's most creative disruptors...

Rei Kawakubo

The spontaneous designer

Rei Kawakubo, the legendary fashion designer and founder of Comme des Garçons, is known for her avant-garde and conceptual designs. And yet, she creates her entire collections without ever sketching a single design! Instead, she relies on a process of trial and error, draping fabric directly on a mannequin to see how it falls and how it can be manipulated. This process allows her to create truly unique and innovative designs. Her designs, such as her "Broken Bride" collection, have pushed the boundaries of what is considered wearable and have made her a true icon in the fashion world.

Tim Burton

The master of whimsy

Tim Burton, the film director and animator, is renowned for his darkly imaginative and whimsical films such as "Edward Scissorhands" and "Beetlejuice". His love for the macabre and his knack for creating quirky, offbeat characters have made him one of the most distinctive and recognizable filmmakers of our time. Tim Burton is always carrying a sketchbook with him and constantly drawing, regardless of where he is or what he is doing. This habit allows him to continuously develop and refine his unique vision and to capture ideas as they come to him.

Ava DuVernay

The rainbow writer

Film director and screenwriter Ava DuVernay is best known for her socially conscious and visually stunning films such as "Selma" and "A Wrinkle in Time". But a lesser-known fact is that Ana DuVernay writes her scripts by hand, using different coloured pens to symbolise different characters and storylines. This tactile process helps her to fully immerse herself in the world of the story and to better understand the interconnections between the characters. Her ability to tackle complex themes and bring diverse stories to the screen has made her one of the most exciting and important filmmakers working today.

Jean-Michel Basquiat

The polymath painter

Infamous Neo-Expressionist painter Jean-Michel Basquiat was known for his raw and powerful paintings that often dealt with themes of race, power, and culture. Jean-Michel was rumoured to always be working on multiple pieces at once, spreading them out across the floor of his studio and constantly moving back and forth between them. This habit allowed him to constantly build upon and refine his ideas, producing a body of work that is both prolific and impactful. His works, such as "Irony of Negro Policeman" and "Charles the First", are powerful commentary on race and power, and have cemented his legacy as one of the most important artists of the 20th century.

Diane von Fürstenberg

The reclining designer

Diane von Fürstenberg is a Belgian-American fashion designer whose wrap dresses have become a staple of women's wardrobes, whilst her relentless drive to empower women through fashion has made her one of the most influential designers of our time. But what you didn't know is that her collections are normally conceptualised upside down! Diane von Fürstenberg believes it allows her to have a different perspective and come up with more innovative designs.

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From Tim Burton's constant sketching to Ava DuVernay’s colours, embracing their quirks allowed these artists to create works that are both innovative and timeless, demonstrating the power of individuality and creativity. So the next time you're feeling stuck or uninspired, try embracing your own quirks and see where they might take you!

As a child in her father's garden, Raysa Farah discovered her love for floristry. Whilst working in the NHS, Raysa continued to nurture her passion for posys and finally allowed it to blossom in the launch of her own luxury floristry studio, LK Verdant. Today, the LK Verdant brand is pruned to perfection—earning Raysa a budding Instagram following and regular features amidst the pages of Vogue and Grazia.

Raysa reflects on her unconventional journey into floral entrepreneurship, her boundless creativity and the timeless appeal of a beautiful bouquet.

Where does your passion for floristry stem from?

Since I was a very little girl, I wanted to be a florist. My love began whilst pottering and playing around my father's stunning floral-filled garden. I literally begged my parents to study floristry after I left school but they persuaded me to pursue a more "conventional" career path. So I did.

When I met Mohammed, at the age of 23, he encouraged my passion and love for flowers. He had the business up and running for me just one month after I told him, "One day when I’m old and retired I will fulfil my dream of being a florist." I started by showcasing flower posies (stems picked from my father's garden) on Instagram—and orders were flying in! I soon became so busy that I had to make a decision on which career I wanted. I took the risk and left my very well-paid and credible job at the NHS to chase my dreams (sounds cliché I know). I haven't looked back since.

How did you find the career transition?

Leaving my job in the NHS was not easy. My parents were so proud of me for completing a psychology BSC degree—I was never a high achiever at school and I really had to work hard for my grades. A successful and stable career in the NHS was everything my parents had hoped for me.

I was getting married to Mohammed and would soon be moving out of my parent's home, which meant I would have financial responsibilities of my own. Naturally, that made me anxious but starting up a business meant investing all of my savings—and when I say all I mean every spare penny—in buying materials, trademarks etc. I was anxious as to whether all of the hard work that went into earning those savings would make me a return.

What learnings have you brought forward from your previous career?

In the NHS, I learnt to be super organised—I am still strict on timekeeping to keep everything in check. I also learnt how to work well with others and that you should always listen—then listen again.

How do you push yourself to think outside the box?

I was one of the first (if not the first) local businesses in my area to take a high-end and on-trend approach to floristry. I embraced my quirky and creative designs and subsequently received masses of support from my target audience. I believe I am naturally creative—I don’t have to try too hard to think of new ideas and concepts. Just being out in nature inspires my designs, new environments and seasons.

What role has social media played in your success?

A tip for new business owners: use social media as your main source of marketing. In year one of business, I worked with a lot of social media influencers by sending them my products to review and promote. I also held blogger events with many well-known brands such as Kiehl's, Elizabeth Arden, L'Oréal, Clive Christian, and Kerastase. I believe this is what set my brand apart and gained me a lot of exposure. An engaged social media audience is essential. My most engaged followers also tend to be my most loyal clients that keep my business successful.

But remember: Instagram can be a very supportive place but being raw and authentic can also attract a lot of unwanted criticism—you need to have thick skin to work with the general public!

What does "bespoke service" mean to you?

• Providing the highest quality product.
• Clear communication.
• Going above and beyond to source what your client wants/needs—I ask my clients plenty of questions and I always follow their brief to a "T"!
• Delivering on time.

Most importantly, "bespoke" means adding a personal touch to your service, your communication, and your product. Each bouquet is unique—one is never the same as another.

You recently added "author" to your list of creative talents—tell us more...

When my little boy got diagnosed with Cancer, I couldn’t find any resources to educate his brother, Adam (aged 4), about why he was losing his hair and gaining drastic weight with medication. So, I decided to write my own children’s book. Writing came very naturally to me and I had so much fun. It brought me a lot of comfort to know that I had the potential to turn something so challenging into something positive. I want children to believe and understand that they are very special even if they look physically different to their friends.

Editors note: Raysa's story, "The Cub Without a Mane" is available for purchase here.

Favourite flower?

I have way too many! But If I had to pick just one: David Austin roses. My entire wedding was adorned with them and they smell incredible.
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Stop and smell the roses—browse Raysa's Instagram or visit her website.

Looking to make your creative process a little more colourful? Download a colour picker chrome extension.

A reliable colour picker extension is a designer's best friend. Colour is an integral part of the design process and finding the perfect hue can be a time-consuming process, but colour picker extensions are a clever way for creatives to speed up their workflow and make sure they always find the perfect shade. With the help of a chrome extension colour picker, you can spend less time spent searching for HEX, RGB, and HSL values, and more time building beautiful colour palettes into your designs.

Designers have a great eye for colour, but an eyedropper chrome extension can provide a little extra support when needed, making a colour picker extension is a must-have tool for designers, artists, web developers and more. Add these top colour picker chrome extensions to your design toolkit to make your creative process more efficient, and decidedly more colourful!

Top 3 colour picker Chrome extensions for designers

The best Chrome extension colour pickers available to creatives who need help picking colours, identifying colour codes and building colour palettes.

Ultimate Color Picker by Verblike

Made for: The meticulous designer

We all know how frustrating it can be when a colour picker can't identify the perfect colour you're looking for. But Ultimate Colour Picker by Verblike is a colour picker chrome extension that leaves no room for error. This colour picker extension has extreme magnification capabilities and a clear user interface, so you can identify the perfect colour for your project, pixel by pixel. And the best part? It has its own shortcut—use [Shift + Alt + C] for fuss-free colour picking!

CSS Peeper

Made for: The curious designer

CSS Peeper is a favourite chrome extension colour picker amongst experienced designers. Say goodbye to digging through code searching for your perfect colour and instead invest in this smart CSS chrome colour picker tailored to designers. With this colour picker extension, you can inspect the colour palette of any web page in an instant. Then simply copy hex codes across into your design software, et voila! CSS Peeper also has advanced features that unveil the fonts, dimensions and even line height used of any site—a colour picker chrome extension perfect for the nosey designer.

Color Picker by Fardos

Made for: The aesthetic designer

With Fardos' colour picker chrome extension, you can save colours and gradients from any site into a neatly organised, easily searchable library. Search the colour picker extension by colour name or hex code and be greeted with a full breakdown of the colour and its complimentary pairings. Unlike other developer tools, Fardos colour picker tool has a great user interface which means building that perfect colour palette just got a whole lot easier!

Andrea Araiza is a food photographer and stylist—browse her Instagram feed for too long and you'll find yourself getting hungry! But for Andrea, the hard work happens away from the plate. The key to Andrea's mouthwatering shots lies in efficient organisation and seamless client collaboration, for which she enlists the help of Visualist.

Introduce yourself...

Hello! My name is Andrea Araiza, I'm a food photographer and stylist. I work with restaurants and brands to capture their menu and their essence. I photograph so many amazing dishes but my favourite has always been salads. I'm not overstating when I say I love all kinds of leafy greens. They bring so much to a plate when paired with the right dressings, fruits, vegetables—anything really! A salad's place in my heart is undisputed.

I also develop my own recipes to photograph in my studio, I love to cook and I am always eager to try new things—learning has always been half the fun behind the camera and the kitchen. I use my social media as a space to share stories about what I do and how I do it.

What projects have you been working on lately?

I have recently conducted a photo shoot with Don Francisco Cheese, a Mexican American brand. The brief was to capture different ways to incorporate their product into classic dishes with a modern twist—we wanted to create light and airy images that had traditional elements but still felt approachable and young.

I used Visualist to plan the shoot. It is so important for me to be collaborative with my clients and Visualist acts as a visual record of our shared thought process.

Most clients are looking for that real personal touch. Without collaboration, clients are usually dissatisfied as they feel the resulting shots are not characteristic of their brand.

Do you use moodboards in your work?

Yes! Moodboards make it easy for my client and I to understand one another and find the common ground. I make my moodboards in Visualist and save them as a PNG to share with my clients. This makes them easily accessible whilst still making me look professional—how you package and deliver your services speaks volumes.

While the low-hanging fruit answer here is definitely through pictures, I want to say that besides being professional, having a good and casual relationship with your clients is also important. It is highly likely that your client will have someone who's supervising the project and who is more than willing to answer all your questions and share the bits of insight that they have with their own or their client's brand. Being close with those you are in touch with will boost confidence and results in general, in my experience.

Is your working style chaotic or organised?

In my opinion, organisation is one of the pillars of creativity and excellence. It is so useful to have an organised, manageable space that can act as a source of inspiration for many projects.

Organising and searching my Visualist library by colour is very useful. I also love being able to sort and search my Visualist library by tags.

What role does colour play in your process?

I teach colour theory as part of my food photography course. Colour theory can seem like an obstacle in creative lines of work as its title implies that there might be only one right answer, but I think that there lies the most surprising lesson of the course. Working colour into food photography is a matter of storytelling, you can complement the feeling of a warm desert with the same colour you'd use to play and contrast with the vibrancy of a fresh meal.

Colours can communicate so much more than we think, it takes time and dedication to get the messaging just right.

Ola G. Snippen is the creator of Norweigan accessory brand, sovesveis. But his ethereal scarves speak to more than just an aesthetic, they embody the timeless beauty of the Scandi wardrobe and the preservation of traditional craftsmanship.

Ola has always dreamt of launching his own fashion brand, and Visualist is helping him to make it a reality.

Introduce yourself...

My name is Ola, I’m a 23-year-old guy living by a fjord in western Norway. I’m currently studying my last year of a bachelors degree in arts, design, and craftsmanship.

I love creating and have always dreamt of becoming a fashion designer. I created my brand sovesveis (which roughly translates to bed hair in English) as a way of making that dream a reality.

Where do you find inspiration?

I get inspiration from all around me. That could be a song, a plant, or the weather. I am always finding material on my computer from 2014, a photo I printed last year, a note from 2017 and so on—my studio is a mess! However, I need my space to be tidy in order to do my best work.

Boards in Visualist have changed the way I work. Now, whenever I find inspiration I can save it in one space, meaning I don’t have to spend time cleaning clutter before getting to work. The process feels more natural in a way.

What's happening at sovesveis?

I’m currently working on a line of accessories for fall and winter. An essential idea behind the brand is to produce garments that are practical and warm but still look good—Norway is a land with unpredictable weather!

The accessories will be mostly hand-knitted by me but I’m also collaborating with a weaver who will make two one-of-a-kind scarves based on bespoke colour palettes I put together. Visualist has been really helpful here, making it easy to take select colours from imagery and then edit to perfection as a colour block.

How important is colour in your work?

Colour is the essence of everything I do. I want to bring colour to the timeless Scandi wardrobe.

Visualist feels like having a table full of pictures, colours, and fabrics that I can mix and match—with the added benefit of being able to shut the computer and not have to clean anything up!

The scarf is such an elegant accessory, what does it symbolise to you?

For me, as a Norwegian, the scarf symbolises warmth, hugs, and craftsmanship. It also reminds me of my mother, who works as a seamstress of Norwegian folk clothing. A lot of traditional craftsmanship is fading, but my brand exists to keep those traditions alive and relevant.

The scarf, may it be silk or wool, makes one look put together, without having to put effort in with the rest of the outfit. The idea behind soveseis is that the details make the outfit.

Nora Hin Tung is a full-time architect and part-time Instagram curator, her playful feed is a reflection of all that Nora finds beautiful in her daily life. Nora uses moodboards to present her concepts to clients but found that too often moodboarding was becoming a chore rather than a joy—until she found Visualist.

Introduce yourself...

Hi! I'm Nora. I'm an architect working between Paris and Reunion Island.

My job allows me to practice my passion: accompanying people in new stages of their professional or personal life. It's a job rich in emotions, very demanding but really exciting.

How do you use moodboards?

Architecture is a visual job. It is important to use moodboards at the beginning of each project, to quickly invite a client into my world and demonstrate the direction I want to take. Moodboards let creativity run wild and they are a rather poetic and efficient way to understand a person's taste—moodboards don't speak to the brain, they speak to the heart.

I am also fond of making moodboards for myself. I gather inspiration and ideas from the beauty in my daily life—an architect's eye knows how to find poetry in everything.

Moodboards don't have to be perfect—agree or disagree?

A moodboard doesn't have to be perfect but it is about perfection. It is about creating emotions—sensations even.

Finding the perfect images, the perfect colour palette, the perfect balance between forms, fulls and voids... It's a more complex exercise than it seems! But it is a thankless job—a customer decides whether they like the board or not in 3 seconds.

As a creative, it's very hard to say, "Ok, I'm done!" It used to take me hours to complete moodboards but thanks to Studio in Visualist I am saving a lot of time.

Favourite feature?

I'm particularly fond of the background remover, a real time saver! I used Visualist for the first time on my phone. I was shocked by the ease of use and the efficiency of the tool. I could never have imagined making a moodboard from my mobile, let alone in just 5 minutes. Visualist is playful, yet really powerful. It makes my life so much easier!