One project down, a zillion to go!
I’m so glad I got over my fear of tackling a gallery wall, because I’m completely in love with how it turned out. Take a look!
Clearly I’m a fan of color and pattern, and it’s taken a long time to figure out how to inject all of the that goodness into this room in particular. I’d been talking up the idea of a gallery wall to Jason for quite some time now, and I think I finally just wore him down. :) Anyhoo, once he jumped on the bandwagon I knew it was now or never.
So first I laid out the art pieces I was considering (you might remember that step from this post):
Then I got to work cutting out pieces of Christmas wrapping paper and magazines in the same size and shape as the frames.
My plan was to stick them to the wall and rearrange them until I liked how everything looked.
Then I just started hanging those suckers up!! Here’s how it looked about halfway through the process.
I had a little helper, which is always nice. :)
And here’s how it turned out!!
It’s a far cry from where this room started. Want to take a little walk down memory lane? If you’ve been around since the beginning of this blog, then you remember how our den used to look:
( Check out more pictures of how our house used to look here. )
Thank goodness we were able to ditch that look – yikes! After we got the bones of the room whipped into shape the room looked empty and a little boring (and kind of like a sofa show room) for a long time:
The next step was to add some fun accents with handmade pillows and a new rug, and then just a few weeks ago we switched things up with our passed-down-through-the-family secretary:
And now, finally, our den feels like us! There are still things I want to change and projects I want to undertake, but I’m really happy with it. (And yes, that’s the Real Housewives of New Jersey on the tv – it’s only like the 3rd time I’ve seen it but I kind of see now why some people are obsessed with that show, it’s addictive!)
Ooh, and of course I have to fill you in on the details for all the artwork!
(1), (6), (9), (10), and (12) are all little paintings or drawings that I’ve done over time. (1) is a series three watercolors that I painted in 6th grade – my family always went to Estes Park in Colorado during the summer and I would spend at least half the trip in the craft center. It was heaven at the time. :) I painted (6) yesterday when I had an empty spot in the gallery wall, and I really like how it turned out! (9) is a pastel and ink that I did of tulips in 9th grade in art class – for some reason it’s stuck around over the years. As for (10), I’ve been wanting an “H” somewhere in our house to represent our last name, and I thought the gallery wall was the perfect place for it. I painted it using a version of this tutorial for a metal look and it turned out pretty well! And last but not least, (12) is a doodle of an elephant (her name is Ellie Phunt) that I drew on the paper tablecloth while I was bored during a review class for the bar exam after law school. I just like it. :)
(2) is a Kandinsky print that I bought from Z Gallerie when I started law school – it was $75 and I felt very grown up at the time for purchasing a piece of art.
(3) is a wood block print that my grandmother did (she was a ridiculously great artist) over half a century ago. My mom made new copies for all of us kiddos a few years back. :)
(4) is (I think) a Blue Morpho butterfly. Also from my grandmother.
(5), (7) and (8) are pieces I picked up in Paris about 5 years ago with my aunt and sister. The two oil paintings (5 and 7) are copies of master paintings (both Monet, I believe) that I bought from a street vendor along the Seine near Notre Dame (I feel oh so snobby writing that!) and had custom framed at Joann’s. (8) in the large black frame is a pastel of the Moulin Rouge that I bought at . . . the Moulin Rouge. It has that old school 20s vibe and amazing color and lots of fun images like can can dancers and the iconic windmill from the Moulin Rouge. I couldn’t get a picture without blur because of the glass, but here’s a close up:
(11) is one of my favorite pictures from our wedding – a big smooch as we’re leaving the church and about to hop into the limo.
(13) used to be painted a pale pink and hung in my bedroom when I was little. It’s a really ornate piece of plaster molding, and I painted the trim the same color as this artwork on the other side of the room.
And of course I can’t resist a few more gratuitous shots, so here you go. :)
All in all, this was a super gratifying project. I can’t wait to hear what you guys think!
Click here to find out how I hung my artwork on the wood paneling without using any nails.
Liz- I love it! It turned out so great!! Now I want to add some texture and different colors to our gallery wall.
I love that you included your own artwork. So unique and personal. :)
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Thanks, Samantha! It feels great to finally get some art on our walls – they’ve been so bare!
I LOVE it! I really like how you took the gallery farther down the wall than immediate eye level. I also really like the super bright colors– it give such a punch to to the room!
And oh my goodness has your den changed! Though, I do hate to say that it does seem a bit darker than from when you first started… he he he
-Meredith
Ha, it was a total dungeon before!!
Oh my gosh that is is so awesome! One of my favorite gallery walls ever. Mine’s not going to be nearly as cool as that.
Erin @ The Impatient Gardener´s last blog post post ..Events to help you get your garden on
l.ov.e.! it turned out so well. love the big scale of it, and all your pieces that mean a lo t to you. great job!
Love how this turned out. I am doing this on my stairway wall after the beadboard wallpaper goes up. I am a little intimedated to do this, but after seeing yours!! I am going to add in some color too.
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I was intimidated too, but it turned out to be really fun! Can’t wait to see yours. :)
It turned out so great, Liz! The color combination is awesome, and I especially love it on your light neutral walls. Good job thinking outside the “gallery-wall-grid box.”
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Incredible! I LOVE it. Gallery walls have been growing on me…I think I now NEED one.
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Fabulousness ! I love your arrangement, bravo girlfriend ! You have a great sense of balance, I love it all. I have one of those blue butterflied, mine came from The Butterfly People in Puerto Rico!
Every time I see your before I cringe, but then your after brings a sigh of relief ! Love all your DIY touches, fantastic my friend!
xoxo
Kate
Thank you, Kate!! :)
Whoa, I love it! That is the perfect arrangement, and that is a hard thing to master. Great job!
I think the key to the whole thing was taping up the cut outs of the frames – it made figuring out the arrangement SO much easier!
Ditto to all the comments here! Perfectly balanced and I love the colors – and the colors all work with each other perfectly. And that before… Egguuch!
I’m with you, total egguuch!
LOVE how it turned out Liz. The pops of turquoise running through so many of these really tie it all together and you arranged them perfectly. Brava!
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Your art installation gives the room so much character. It’s beautiful!
This is great, love the moulin rouge picture, still love that rug though:)
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It looks great! Very balanced, colorful and eye-pleasing. Two thumbs up!
I absolutely LOVE it. The elephant and the Paris works are my fave! You’re so talented, you artiste, you! It really makes the room! And I love how you put it up OVER the molding – not sure I would have even thought to do that! You did a super job and should be proud Liz!
it looks so good! i love your “H”….and everything else! i’m thinking about attempting a painting like jamie meares’ as well…it’s so fun and colorful!
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I was wondering if anyone would catch the inspiration! I just died over that painting when Jamie’s home was featured in High Gloss. I would love to see your interpretation of it, I know it would be fabulous! (And thanks for the metallic letter tutorial!)
Amazing! I love how you used such a variety of different types of artwork. And the layout around your secretary is perfect!
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That looks fantastic! I am super impressed by all of the art created by you…wow! :)
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Liz, How about a close-up of Ellie? She looks wonderful! I’ll bet your former art teachers are proud. :)
I love the framed architectural moulding, too.
Disclaimer – this is the world’s worst photo and I need to reframe her so that all of her gloriousness fits within the frame! :)
She started out as a true doodle and then I realized she was looking elephant-y, so it started going that direction. The things you will do when you’re bored!! :)
So pretty! I was just thinking about a gallery wall as I was walking up my staircase yesterday. But don’t know if I’m brave enough to tackle it. I love the idea of hanging paper in place of frames first. Smart.
By the way, I’m shamefully a Real Housewives fan too. I don’t set my DVR for it but I have been known to have the TV on during some weekend marathons!
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LIZ! This seriously looks like a page from a magazine. Usually I feel a little ‘bleh’ about gallery walls, but this is fabulous and unique. Not cookie cutter at all and so much drama with all the different types of art. LOVE!
It looks great! I love how it turned out, and how all the artwork means something special to you!
~Chelsea
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WOW!! Liz, I love all the art work you choose for the art wall everything looks so good. The color of the art in your family room really pops of the wall and gives the room a nice sophisticated lived in look — it looks so fresh!!! Again amazing job
This looks great. I love the layout that you created. there’s a lot of variation in style which is really refreshing.
It looks fantastic! I love the items you included–they are so colorful, and the plaster molding piece is really cool. Love the way it turned out.
I love your gallery wall! Your wall helped inspire my own and I wanted to let you know I linked this page to my gallery wall page to show where i pulled some of my inspiration from and where the wallpaper idea came from, hope you don’t mind :)
Hi! I just wandered over here after clicking on your link from a comment to an older Centsational Girl post. I don’t know if you have some kind of notification system to tell you when there is a new comment to an older post, but I’ll take a chance and post here anyway. I LOVE your gallery wall! Bold it is, and not something I think I would have thought to put in my home, but I have to tell you it really speaks to me. I love the pieces you chose, and the sentimentality of them, and how fantastically they work together. How cool is it that you included pieces from elementary and high school? Congratulations on completing this so wonderfully, and I’m glad you found it so immensely gratifying.
– Michiganhome
Just saw this in your sidebar! >> rave review goes here << Just as much as I like the wall, the photoshopped number key is really attractive too — the red stroke around the text boxes? Fancy!
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