When a Scrapbooker is not Scrapbooking, what is she doing?

Christine Meier, Vice President and Co-Founder Canvas Corp


When a Scrapbooker is not Scrapbooking, what is she doing? Studies show she is working full time, taking care of her family and decorating her home. The scrapbooking market has unleashed creativity in a huge demographic of women and that creativity is coming off the pages and into the spaces of her home.

Scrapbooking has hit the home décor scene in many ways. Examples include scrapbook pages in an oversized format that are designed to be pieces of art, photo walls that are created with enlarged photos, beautiful scrapbooks that become the new coffee table books, scrapbook rooms are being designed to provide a venue for the hobby and furniture and storage pieces that are created for the home.

Consumers are no longer looking for projects to keep their hands busy. Rather they are in search of solutions-based ideas that preserve memories, promote family, simplify their lives, increase organization, reduce clutter, recycle items for new uses, and allow them to represent their individuality. As a scrapbook page captures a moment in time, a special event and even beautiful facial expressions; homespacing is about capturing the design, emotion and vision for a home space in a very similar format.

The design process of the home is as individual as the homeowner and the amount of research, organization and planning that goes into the process determines the overall success of the project. As scrapbooker’s have learned the process of organizing their pictures, journaling their memories, and creating pages that tell the story visually, they can now transfer that experience into the design of spaces in their homes.

Consumer driven design publications are the number one place consumers get their ideas for home décor. The home design inspiration, as with a scrapbook page, can come from anywhere. Bringing these ideas together to create the theme of the space is a great place to start and brings to life the spaces of the home. Adding the room components such as fabric, wall color, wall décor, etc., become what embellishments are to a scrapbook page. Capturing these ideas and inspiration onto a design board is what Homespacing is all about.

The Homespacing process breaks down into four easy steps, beginning with the basic measurements of the space, finding the inspiration to bring the visual plan to life, space planning the furniture and accessories and finalizing the process by completing the room.

How often do you walk into a furniture store or a paint store with the intent to buy something for the home without a plan for the space, no knowledge of the measurements of the room and nothing that represents the other colors that will live in the space? The visual application of Homespacing is an inspiration board that brings all of the elements of the space together, most effectively explained as a scrapbooking for the home. Home inspiration boards reflect the function, style and design of the space and can be detailed and elaborate or it can be simple and to the point. The goal is to visually bring to life the space so that there is a plan in place, allowing for better decisions to be made and fewer changes required during the design process.

Many of the same tools and supplies found in today’s scrapbooking stores make the creation of inspiration boards even more exciting. Boards can be made with scrapbooking papers as the inspiration for fabrics in the home, stickers and die cuts can represent creative art on the walls and artwork in the room and the tools and supplies used to make a scrapbook page can be used to cut circles, punch out holes, etc. Scrapbooking elements help tell the visual story of the space.

Scrapbook stores now have the opportunity to market to this savvy consumer and begin developing a larger and even more loyal customer base by offering products that provide them the tools they need to inspire and capture their dreams of spaces in their home. They can also offer a new twist to the traditional scrapbooking crops is a Homespacing crop, where an interior designer or decorator can be on hand to help walk the participants through the Homespacing process. Helping them to think through their home spaces and bringing them to life visually. Not only can the professional walk them through the process, but also answer design questions, provide design ideas, solve space planning dilemmas or help with storage and organization solutions.

The forward-thinking scrapbooking stores will establish a leadership position by addressing the need in the market for DIY customer and begin marketing their products to support this trend. Stores that see the vision beyond the inspiration board and scrapbooking aspect, may dive deeper into the market segment and offer products that help the consumer complete the project, such as great ropes, tags, clips, hardware, stencils, paint, etc. These items are larger versions of the very embellishments found in scrapbook stores today. The scrapbook store has a reputation of offering the most up to date styles and design for scrapbooks and now they can expand to the walls of the home in the same manner.

And it is important to remember that this does not signal an end to the traditional scrapbooking customer and categories, but rather a shift in the product offering to adapt to the demographics of today’s Creative Do-It-Yourself consumer, who we know is also a scrapbooker and offers a huge opportunity to increase customer base and market share.