For months I’d been scrolling through Pinterest obsessing over gallery walls. It had been a year since I’d moved back home and my room still lacked my personality in it. I had pieces of artwork I had created and collected over time and they were just lying around. With a 20 feet wide bedroom wall split into two by a door in the middle, it was a blank canvas waiting to be filled with assorted pieces of art. Here’s how I put together my gallery wall using a wireframe.
I put together a board of the kind of artworks I wanted to add to it and with a paper, pad, and a bunch of measurements I set out to design my gallery wall.
The Artworks
I started out by sketching out on a piece of paper and identifying the pieces I needed to put together my wall. In terms of artworks, I had two paintings I had painted a few years ago, some ink drawings I did in college a few polaroids, a few postcards with Monet and Dali’s work on it. I needed more for my wall to really look put together.
Two hoops I embroidered. One of a girl in a field of flowers inspired by Pinterest. One of a sunrise in the mountains based on a drawing I had made.
To show my love for dancing, I got a poster printed and painted a dancing couple.
For my polaroids, I bought a frame and hammered some nails on the edges, connected them with strings, and clipped a few polaroids on them.
I hosted drinks with two of my best friends and we painted three square canvas’ to commemorate our friendship.
There was a dream catcher I had that my parents picked up on one of their travels.
I painted a geometric sunny side up. My favorite breakfast food and color. And painted a geometric color block kind of painting.
I got an ancient map of Paris printed since it’s one of my favorite cities. A typography poster with the alphabet on it to denote my love for design and type.
A few other assorted pieces completed the list of artworks I wanted on my wall.
The Planning
I wanted the flexibility to experiment with layouts before I started drilling into the wall, so I traced the frames on large pieces of paper and lay them out in front of the wall. An afternoon of shuffling these around and I had a pretty good idea of how I wanted them. Just to make sure all the colors went together I placed the actual artworks on top of the wireframe.
Once I was happy with it all, I taped these sheets of paper onto the wall so I would know exactly where to drill.
Waking up to a wall full of art that expresses who I am doesn’t get old!
Here’s a series of images of the process of putting together the gallery wall using a wireframe
Check out some of my other work on my blog!