Gallery Wall. Done.

Last night while eating dinner I summoned the motivation (after doing 40 minutes of cardio) to finish the gallery wall.  Remember we started last week and T wasn't feeling hanging all the frames?   He managed to hang the top left one.... and call it a night, lol.  I said I would hang the one below him and then we realized that everyone of the frames except one only had one hook/holder - those are EASY!  So I did three (I was on the roll)

 It was at this point when I began to get a little worried... it wasn't going to be centered.

 So originally it was just supposed to stop at the white frame/pink artwork.  But It wasn't even close to centered so I added the bottom right.

And finished with the top right (T hung this one because it had two holes to put in the wall).  Notice that we also moved the smaller frame up top more centered?

Ta-da!  

So after almost two and a half weeks of worrying about the perfect layout... we ended up improvising.  Why did I let it bother me so?  I mean its a wall and after all they do make tons of stuff to fill holes with in the event there would have been a disaster.  I like it and I'm excited to have more in our home.   It's fun to be able to have things that you created, enjoy, and love to look at on your wall. 

Picture Perfect?

When we moved into our townhouse together (big step up from the apartment) I had everything I wanted on the wall within the first month, yes, I said month.  We have been living in our house close to a year and we barely have anything on the walls.  Why is this?  Is it that it is "our" house? Or that I'm scared to hurt the walls?  I shouldn't be because by no means are they brand new, 34 to be exact.  I think that it's crazy - as much as we have done to make it our own we still have all our paintings, frames, mirrors stacked in the SR.  So over this past weekend I played around with a few of the frames we had... first 5 frames... then added one, two, six more and I ended up with this on my DR table...

 

I let it lay there a day or so...

After a few more days of being sick to my stomach, a friend's birthday dinner, and being too lazy to go out in the rain we decided it was time to go to Lowes and get the hardware to hang all the frames.  Some of the frames did not have hardware for us to hang them on the wall.  I figured once I get T to start hanging things he would be on a roll and we could knock it all out at once? 

These were the main culprits without hanging hardware on the back. BUT I did save about $8 on each frame because of that. 

 Here we are putting the hanging hardware on the backs of the frames... this wasn't the easiest of tasks.  The nails are so short you can't hold onto them and nail them.  We ended up having to pre-drill the hole and then used pliers to hold the nail while we nailed it into the frame.

 After I left the DR table alone for a few days I realized that I wasn't in love with the arrangement of the frames.  I think it was because there was too much going on for the LR... just too busy.  So then I got to this arrangement of all the frames larger and cut some out. 

 Then this arrangement.... while it was asymmetrical it didn't look balanced to me.

 Ta-da. Winning.  (The frame on the top right may become black in the near future - when I get home and it is still daylight or the next time I am here on the weekend with sun)

 So by now I'm sure you are (or aren't) wondering what the set of four prints in the frames were doing?  They are going in our guest bath.  I'm sorry I haven't taken the time to learn/invest in photo editing software so the mats (as you saw above are NOT yellow).  As you can tell only two of the four frames were hung...

 The other two rest in the GB waiting till the mood strikes T

 Only one of the frames was hung on the wall that night.  After we put the couch back it may be too high, but I was worried that I didn't want them to appear too low either, it'll work out in the end.

And the DR table currently looks like this, lol.

In case there are any questions about the art work:  the beagle painting I did of Slade about three years ago.  The pink piece with the ships and bird I bought off the streets of NYC the summer after my graduation from high school (OMG - that was 6 years ago almost!).  The turquoise piece is a rendering of the Raleigh skyline and the crazy looking one on the bottom left were both gifts from my MIL that came from Etsy.  Above the pink piece there is a small card size print from a VA winery by a local VA artist.  The square frame to the right of the pink piece was a "thank you" card when I purchased the four prints that are going in the GB.... but I thought that since the artist created it, why not use it?   

Gallery Wall

This month is our six month living in our house home.  I can't believe it - literally it feels like yesterday we were moving in at 8pm on a weeknight and ordering out Olive Garden (moving works up a big appetite).  While we have accomplished a lot (for two people who both work full time jobs) I believe we need to turn it up a notch.  The past few weeks we have been on top of things more because we realized we fell in a slump where we had no motivation to do projects.  T may sometimes feel otherwise - but I am excited to have my motivation back and continue on our journey making the house our own.


So.... my project of the week is to start (and hopefully finish) our gallery wall.  I can look around the house and literally see three things on the wall (a print above the mantel, our organizer in the kitchen, and a mirror).  I have a few thoughts when thinking about our gallery wall - the first is where?  In our last place we had a long LR(living room) so I used the "gallery wall" to balance the wall that the TV was on.  

Excuse the failed Christmas Card Attempt - notice a portion of the gallery wall?  

(I apologize that this is the only photo I have - pre blogging days)

So Hello Pinterest! - I didn't want to use the same set up..... and I'm also debating spraying the frames white? OR maybe a combo of black and white?  Here are a few inspirations I have.... 

I love gallery walls because they break all the "rules" of hanging pictures.  

The different colors of frames.  The mix of framed vs. unframed.  

I love the asymmetry and the large white mats - leaves the wall open. 

These are a few of the frames that I have had on hand and previously used in past places.  I want to include in my new gallery wall ... 

These two images were my mother and father from their twenties... I hope to have duplicate frames for my In laws and hang them in a square somewhere in the house? 

The Beagle print was from T and I's first trip to an Savannah, GA in 2008. The Boat/Seagle print was from a trip to NYC with my Uncle and Aunt in 2005.  

Recently I have acquired some new prints.... 

The top two are birthday presents that I had pinned a while ago on pinterest from my mother in law.  The bottom left two are additional cards from the top left artist.  The bottom right artist did the drawing for a vineyard we frequent in Louisa, VA.