The Instagram Saved Folder is the Modern Moodboard
What's in yours?????
Published
Saved Folder is a monthly column where our creative director asks people she thinks are ~cool~ to share what they’ve bookmarked to their instagram saved folder recently.
Every new creative project that was assigned to me in art school would start with the same process: the moodboard. I’d scour books and the internet for images I loved, and then printed them out and pasted them on a posterboard to solidify them in my brain. Even when the projects would end I’d keep them; it was like a physical paper trail of my current visual obsessions. A few months ago when scrolling through my instagram saved folder to feel some inspiration i realized - has this mechanism become the new moodboard? And if so, what are other people putting in theirs? So naturally, I had to ask.
“This showed up on my FYP last week and I can't stop thinking about it...I wish I had a genuine reason for why I need this but I think I've just always loved mini knick knacks and now that I'm an adult and can actually buy these things, it's a dangerous place to be!”
“I love this influencer and her photos are always really creative and I love how both of these photos just come together and feel really natural. It feels like a real moment in time and that's really hard to capture!”
“I'm getting married in Portugal next August and have been having so much fun scouring the internet for reference photos to add to my moodboard. In my opinion, stylist Mafalda Patricio's wedding was absolute perfection — I love how she incorporated the area's natural landscape into the reception and really captured the colorful liveliness of the country in her tablescapes.”
“Lately, I've been absolutely obsessed with old persian miniatures and tilework, especially anything illustrated during the Qajar period. Discovering these women, depicted so beautifully with facial hair, tiny lips, and long lashes, helped me reframe my own features outside of a Western context. I saved this post by artist Parisa Dale as a reference for a tattoo I'm hoping to get soon — sketched by another Iranian artist, Mariam Tafsiri!”
“Almost exactly a year ago, I left my editorial job after a decade in the industry to pursue writing full-time. The first few months were really fucking challenging, and I found myself adopting more of an "abundance" mindset when it came to spending — choosing to believe that whatever money I poured into my business would eventually come back to me tenfold. I saved this meme to send to my sister Ava, who is pursuing curve modeling and often in a similar boat, because sometimes you kind of just have to laugh at yourself. Lol.”
“I love the inherent delusion of the Saved folder. Yes, I will definitely do some home DIYs, follow some elaborate video recipes, buy an expensive chore shirt. All of this will happen later. This video of citrus being artfully peeled is a perfect example. I’m going to get really good at this. Later.”
“About a year ago I started raising ducks and the algorithm really knows it. This inspirational duck drawing by one of my fav artists is one of approx 300 million duck drawings I’ve saved in the last month.”
And my own saves as well, because whats the point of the game if you can't play too?
I’ve loved Helle Mardal’s candy glass sculptures and home items for a while now, and their new collection is beyond. Adding super vibrant color to a more classic space isn’t easy to do, but this image of them showcasing The Candy Series gave me such color inspiration for my new apartment! I just love home objects that feel different and organic, and seeing all of them stacked up together is such a visual feast.
Yeah yeah yeah I know I won’t shut up about pink and red - but this cake takes it to a whole other level. How the fuck do you even make a checkered cake like this? I’ve seen a few of these types of cake in my day, but I’ve never seen a cake checkered on the inside AND outside with different shades on both! I’m not a baker (or a cook if you’re wondering) but i feel like I could spend the whole summer trying to master this cake vision. It was made by an ENGINEER - just to paint a picture of how much work went into this beauty, and how i will surely not be able to make it.