That "always start with black and white" advice from a senior designer actually slowed me down

A lead designer at my old agency kept saying all layout work should start in grayscale before adding color. I followed that rule for almost 2 years. Last month I had a branding project for a local coffee shop in Portland where the whole vibe was built around a specific muted green. I spent 3 extra days fighting with neutral values before I finally just threw the green in during the first sketch phase. The client loved the early comps way more than the grayscale versions. Has anyone else found times where ignoring the "pro tip" saved them hours?

2 comments

2 Comments

eric35910d ago

Respectfully, I see this differently. The grayscale rule isn't about making things look good without color, it's about checking your contrast and hierarchy before you get distracted by pretty hues. If your whole brand was built around a specific muted green, you could have still started with a gray that matched its value level and swapped it in later. That green would have popped the same way. The senior designer's advice works when you treat it as a structural tool, not a creative limit. Sounds like you skipped the contrast check and just went with vibes, which worked this time but won't always save you.

taylor_moore9d ago

Always seems like y'all are making design way more complicated than it needs to be, @eric359.