Designing a gallery wall is a great opportunity to show off your personality to family and friends while improving the look of your Long Island home. This concept is new to many homeowners, but it’s an easy do-it-yourself project once you understand what’s involved. That’s why our real estate agents have devised a six-step gallery wall process to get you started.
- Choose the Centerpiece
You’ve probably noticed that most gallery walls have at least one big piece of artwork. This is the first thing you should figure out because it will set the tone for all the other pieces. Even though it’s your centerpiece, you shouldn’t put it right in the center. Also, choose the next biggest piece and place it diagonally, whether next to the first or far away. - Pick Up the Materials
Creating a gallery wall doesn’t take a whole lot of materials. You’ll simply need a hammer, a pencil, nails, and perhaps some drywall mounts for the heavier pieces. You don’t want to interrupt your project with a run to the store, so you should gather all the required materials before hanging any artwork. - Sketch the Layout
You don’t want to start putting up artwork and hope for the best. Well, you can… but you shouldn’t. The best plan is to create a rough sketch of what you want the gallery wall to look like. Once that’s done, emulate it as best you can by placing sheets of paper on the wall that are the approximate sizes of each piece of artwork. - Choose Various Artwork
Now, we come to the most exciting part—choosing your artwork. There are obviously no rules, but here are a few things to consider:- For a more curated look, figure out a color palette and then choose your artwork based on that.
- Instead of limiting your artwork to squares, throw in plenty of horizontals and verticals.
- Adding a personal item or two (or several) into the mix is the perfect way to improve your gallery wall.
- Don’t forget to use different types of frames and maybe even have a piece of artwork or two with no frame at all.
- Absolutely anything can be art, including a movie stub from a first date, an item that reminds you of your parents, an old pet collar, etc.
- Fill In Gaps Between Art
Starting with a layout will help you avoid large gaps most of the time, but some blank areas may be too big for your tastes. You can easily fill in these gaps with small, personal items such as photographs, postcards, film strips, playbills, or anything else you’d like to put on display. You may even want to integrate gaps into your layout and then figure out what you can put there once everything else is done. - Switch Things Up as Needed
No matter what you do with your gallery wall, remember that nothing is set in stone. You can switch things up whenever you’d like. Perhaps you see a new piece of artwork while you’re out shopping, and you decide to replace an existing one. Maybe you want to switch the position of various pieces every month or so. Or you could redo the entire gallery wall every year or two.
Our team has many more decorating ideas for Long Island homes. Contact us, and we’ll help you find your dream home today.