Graphic design has the distinction of being a professional discipline that requires both technical prowess and a large amount of creative juice. While the intricacies and skills required to be a good designer can be learned at graphic design school, nobody is immune from periods in which their creative well runs dry.
The question is, how do you best get those creative juices flowing once again?
Luckily, there are more than a few useful resources online which can help inspire new ideas and push you to greater heights. Whether you design websites, logos, work with typography, or design packaging, scroll on to discover…
The Best Websites for Graphic Design Inspiration
While all of the following are well worth checking out, we’ve categorized them by a few different fields to further aid your inspiration. First up:
Websites for Graphic Web Designers
The Inspiration Grid – Adored by both designers and even non-designers alike, The Inspiration Grid is a delight to flick through due to the many varied and creative images that are hosted there. Nice, clean, and easily searchable by category, this is a well of inspiration no designer should be without.
Ideabook – The best practices of web design, and the software used to execute it, is perpetually changing; so much so that even the most experienced designer needs to continually keep his or her learning up to date. For that, there’s Ideabook; a great source of free design tutorials.
Swissmiss – Run by talented New York designer Tina Roth, this design blog provides regular highlights of great design of all flavors from around the world. Blog posts are short and sweet, giving you more inspiration and less noise.
Wabbaly – A long-running blog which acts as an amalgamation of all of the above; fantastic examples of graphic design, great articles discussing the craft, and plenty of tutorials to help you emulate it all.
Information is Beautiful – The famous brainchild of David McCandless. If you haven’t already seen this frequently updated collection of stunning data visualizations, you’re missing out on a big dose of design inspiration.
Canva – Canva is a graphic design tool aiming to teach the graphic design to the world, and regularly publishes fresh and useful content for both beginnings and seasoned graphic designers.
Websites for Logo Designers
Brand New – When a corporate logo gets a face-lift, the Brand New blog will be there waiting to dissect the results – both good and bad – with an expert eye. This is essential reading for logo designers looking to learn from design done well (and not so well).
Logolitic – A very comprehensive (and neatly categorized) blog covering logo design practices and the wider industry. The advice and tutorial posts are aimed towards the beginner to semi-pro logo designer, so if you’re just starting out, this is the one for you.
Logo Design Love – A superb collection of spotlight posts which shines a light on notable logo designers, their works, and the fascinating histories behind some iconic logos.
Brands of the World – According to the site itself, it’s the world’s biggest collection of free vector logos, giving your work an added professional flair with less hassle and no cost.
Websites for Typographers
TypeInspire – As the name suggests, TypeInspire is a treasure trove of gorgeous typography and a good port of call for generating new ideas when you’re stuck in a rut.
Type Everything – A Tumblr blog that features some of the best typography we’ve every come across, all in one place. There are many categories to flick through; from animated type gifs, graffiti, monograms, hand drawn, and beyond (scroll to the bottom to check these out.)
Typedia – “A mix between IMDb and Wikipedia, just for type.” So goes the site description of Typedia, and it’s pretty apt. It is a community resource which anyone can get behind, and a very useful portal for those who don’t know where to start with typography.
Playtype – A digital type agency in Denmark. Even just browsing through the store is enough to get the ideas flowing.
