Monday, July 23, 2012

gallery wall around the playroom tv

Three houses ago, before the blog, we bought a gallery wall of art from West Elm.  When we moved to our apartment in Fort Lee, it hung in our dining room.


When we moved to Westfield, that house was full of windows and doorways and there was not very much wallspace for hanging large art installations.  It stayed in a box in the basement.

Now that we moved here to California, I have the perfect place for it.


Originally, my plan in the playroom was to mount the tv centered on the wall, and put two large corkboards on either side to hang the kids' artwork.  Sadly, there were no studs in the middle of the wall to mount the tv on (we have the 18 holes to prove it), and the tv was mounted off to the side. 

Since the tv was off-center, I thought a gallery wall would be a good place to put the West Elm pictures.  It only took four months and a massive purge of the garage to find that box.



Almost none of the original art inserts from West Elm remains, although obviously we are still using all the frames.  I had a few more black Ikea Ribba frames that I tossed in the mix, plus a few more frames that I spray-painted black.

We put some art from the kids in about half the frames.  I moved my grandmother's paintings from the foyer to the art wall.


One print I was really excited about is the Michelle Armas Antonia print, which is now available at Land of Nod.  (Its the red abstract print below, next to my grandma's peaches.)


Although I love these frames and their clean lines, every single house I have ever hung them in--THEY ARE CROOKED.  Always.  I put that blue tacky stuff behind them to keep them straight and they are still crooked.  Forgive me and my crooked paintings.


The wall is still a work in progress.  The large frame to the far left is a scrap of my curtain fabric until I come across a piece of art the right size.  I've ordered another 8x11 poster for another frame that I'll share when it gets here.

I have a few more frames to hang, and the wall has some room to grow.




8 comments:

  1. what a difference it makes with blending the tv in!

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  2. Use 3m Velcro with the easy release to keep the straight.

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  3. It looks great. It should never be "finished"! Changing out the pictures as your life moves on will keep it fresh, new and alive.

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  4. It looks fantastic! Good job. The house is really coming along: any chance of a tour, soon?

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  5. This kind of project would be the end of me. You and your crooked frames are way ahead of me! :-)

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  6. So cute. I want to do something like this in an upstairs hall with a mix of my daughter's art and pictures and real art.

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  7. This looks fantastic! Very colorful and fun! I have a gallery wall full of family photos and they are always crooked too... I am thinking about using those Command velcro things to rehang them all in about 3 wks when I recover from ORC :)

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