gallery wall: check!

Yay! So excited to show you photos of our new gallery wall. I spend much of the day Friday on this, working away at it like a puzzle. I didn't purchase anything new for the project, so was literally piecing together items from my collection of frames, art (term used loosely as you'll see below!) and matting (or cardboard :)).

I gathered everything together and started out with this....

Then I began playing around with placement and removing/editing pieces.  At this stage I also started to decide where switches were needed - you can see evidence of this process towards the left side of the below photo (playing around with a too-big white mat in the long black frame).

After much shuffling and shifting, I started hanging, and ended up with this...

I love it.

A friend asked me if I measure, and the answer is no. I am not much of a measurer, in general. I admire people who can operate like that, but I do not have the patience!  Eye-balling is my style.

The peacocks above and elephant below are actually greeting cards, and I love how they turned out! I actually saw some very similar art not long ago in a room by Anna Spiro and it caught my eye...so when I spotted these cards the following day at Cost Plus I was giddy!  Did I mention that I LOVE them?

There are only two pieces in the bunch that are "official" ... all others are items I made into artwork with just a little effort...things like photos taken by me, one picture torn from a magazine years ago, one piece of fancy paper and a few cards!  Also, I think only two or three of the frames were purchased new.  Three others were thrifted, and all others were freebies from friends (when moving, down-sizing, etc.).

I had been wanting to do something about the arrangement underneath the TV console, and after seeing the above photos I couldn't wait any longer.  See below - I simply attached a scarf as a table skirt, using upholstery nails (pretty similar to thumb tacks, just a bit stronger).  I like it much better than before, but don't love it. Will have to figure out a more permanent solution here.  (also, the light fixture reflection is kind of driving me crazy but we're just going to pretend it's not there. okay? thanks.)

The trick is to not have too much going on, or it gets a little crazy (notice several large mats).  Also it helps if there's some common thread or continuity -- here, a little black weaving through most of the arrangement kind of ties it together.  There's no formula, but I think that loosely following a few principles such as these make the project easier.

It was such fun putting it together.  Hope you like it as much as we do!