7 Apps for Managing Your Next Interior Design Project

Staying creatively inspired can be tough, even for the most professional interior designer or artistic homeowner. Whilst it can be fun to play around with different tastes and styles, the day-to-day challenges can make it hard work and it can be difficult to carry out your design.

Whether you’re working on a client’s project or you’re thinking of painting the walls and moving the furniture around in your own home, experimenting before you do all the work can save time and money. The boom of smartphone and on-the-go apps has made it possible to visually see the final product before any heavy lifting is done or money has been spent. We look at the hottest apps around that will make your next interior design project hassle free, and give you a good dose of inspiration when you’ve hit a brick wall.

1. Inspire…Pinterest and Houzz

There is nothing better, from a design perspective, than to get lost in thousands of photos and notions to mould your own creative world – for free. Pinterest and Houzz both offer that, plus more.

Pinterest is a virtual pinboard where you can store (or “pin”) every idea that sparks your attention. You can categorise and create your own boards and make them public or private for your own use. The app gives you oodles of inspiration and allows you to “pin” anything you see on the web, which opens the door to a world of opportunities. This is a perfect app for storing and sharing photo boards too. If you’re hard drive is screaming for some space, then this will make life a lot easier for you.

If that’s not enough inspiration for you, Houzz is a fantastic app that collects photos of nearly every type of room, location and product. Labelled as the best interior design idea app, it allows you to save photos to access offline and includes a directory of local designers, architects and contractors to help you with job.

2. Personal Assistant… Home Design DIY – Mark on Call

Every designer, whether experienced or just starting out, needs an assistant. For $2.99, Mark on Call is your own personal assistant on call whenever and wherever you need him. Without having to lift more than a finger, the app allows you to experiment with your existing space or create your own dream room.

Mark on Call gives you the confidence to let your imagination run wild, snapping up pictures of inspiration. Because you’re able to design the space from the app, it saves you the hassle of failed room rearranging or spending money on something that doesn’t work.

3. Colour…MyPantone

For most interior designers, colour is your best friend. Even if you’re a black and white kind of artist, being armed with as many tints as possible is always handy. MyPantone can be purchased for $9.99 and allows you to extract colours from photos or web pages to create and save onto your own palette.

The app offers more than 13,000 colours and once you produce your own, you’re able to share them with social media friends or members on the MyPantone forum. It also comes equipped with educational presentations and design and colour tips to get your juices flowing. Once you have all the colour inspiration you need, you can print out your palette and apply it to your home space.

4. Light the Way… Sun Seeker

Making use of natural sunlight to enhance your space can give some perfect design opportunities. If you’re revamping an existing room or moving into a new home and unsure how to dress up the windows, Sun Seeker is you’re sun finder (even on a cloudy day!).

At $6.99, Sun Seeker is a 3D augmented reality viewer equipped with a compass and camera showing the solar path. The app tells you the sun’s rise and set times, the solar direction for each daylight hour and its path through winter and summer.

If that’s not technical enough, the app also gives you shadow lengths and can separate paths into day and night segments – all shown by simply holding your phone up to the window. The interface is user-friendly and looks fantastic for iPhone and iPad users, and a really handy app to have for any homeowner that loves to take advantage of the sun’s natural light.

5. Style…Homestyler Interior Design

Selected as one of the best Apple products of 2013, Homestyler brings all the ideas that are flooding your brain to life. In just one snap, you can take a picture of the space and create your own 3D home design playground guaranteeing to provide you with hours of fun, and inspiration.

Instead of wasting hours and energy moving furniture around, Homestyler lets you place high-quality 3D products in the room and change them around as much as desired. Light fixtures can be hung from the ceiling, rugs and mirrors shuffled around and walls painted with a swipe of your finger. Share your ideas with friends or colleagues, browse through local professional portfolios and get answers to all your design and product questions.

6. Sketch… Penultimate

The easiest way to sketch and document your interior design ideas is through Penultimate – an app that combines the natural pen experiences with the flexibility and syncing of Evernote.

Like with ordinary paper, Penultimate provides a simple and intuitive way to write, scribble and sketch ideas with all the essential tools. Notes can be searched and synced to your computer and mobile device, without the hassle of your design plans getting misplaced or crumpled up at the bottom of your bag.

The app allows you to take photos of the space or source of inspiration, then room to scribble your notes, observations or measurements along the side. Within minutes, your draft project can be shared with friends, clients or colleagues. The free app is fun, easy to use with personalised paper to make you feel like it’s really the real thing.

7. Organise… GoDesign

With any home remodelling project, good organisation is essential – especially if you’re dealing with clients and large projects. At $12.99, it may seem a little steep for an iPod app but GoDesign is the handiest way to take control of everything you’re working on, and for whom.

Information is divided into projects, clients, items and vendors making everything easily accessible and systemised. GoDesign is user-friendly and keeps track of everything you need. It’s an ideal app for those starting out in the business, interior design pro’s and homeowners with a passion for new spaces, and can make any design lover feel like a true professional.

There we go! We hope you have fun downloading these great apps and seeing what works for you. Do you have any other favourites? Please let us know and we’ll add them to the list.