Friday, April 17, 2015

Hallway Gallery Wall

Well, friends, the hallway gallery wall is finished! I'm so excited to share it with you!

I'm going to go ahead and apologize for the quality of these pictures. The hallway has no windows, so it's very tricky to photograph!
The upstairs hallway has had bare walls ever since we moved into this house three years ago. Whomp, whomp. I just couldn't decide what I wanted to put up! After some inspiration and lots of thought, I finally decided a gallery would be the best fit and would provide a space to display family photos.

I used painters tape to roughly figure out my layout and how many of which size frames I'd need. It also let me "live with" the gallery for a while before committing to put this many nail holes in my wall. ;) This picture was before I painted the walls. You can see my tutorial for how I painted the stairwell and hallway here.
We've accumulated a few extra picture frames over the years, so I shopped our house for any frames that would work for the gallery. Eleven of the fifteen frames on the wall were frames that we already owned. That saved us a bunch of money! I spray painted several of them and added mats to others to create a cohesive look.
I like white and lots of symmetry, so going dark and random with the frames was a bit of a stretch for me. I live dangerously, I know. Ha! I really like the way the black frames with white mats mirror the stair banister and railing colors! And, I must say, hanging frames randomly is much easier to hang than trying to do a grid or row like I usually do! ;)
I ordered the large paper mache letter from Joann's for only $5 and spray painted it black. I love the font style!
As I've mentioned previously, my grandma is a painter. She did this painting for Jeremy and I's wedding and Grandpa had it framed for us. I love it! It's so special! I did all the photos in black and white so that the painting would really pop and be the star of the show.
I've been crushing on curvy frames for a few years now and recently found some at Michael's for super cheap in the unfinished wood aisle. I paid less than $5 for the big one and only $1 for the small one. Crazy, right?! I gave them both a coat of spray paint and attached a picture hanger to the back. Easy peasy!
 I love this picture of my grandpa and I from when I was a baby! His smile melts my heart!
I found this cute little patterned frame at Michael's. They had an entire shelf of adorable, patterned frames!
I put frames around the light switch and the thermostat to help them blend into the gallery. Worked like a charm!
It's so fun to come up the stairs and be greeted with this now!

Hope you all have a fabulous weekend!


Linking up to Southern Savvy Style and other awesome bloggers!

36 comments:

  1. Hi, I'm visiting from Nifty Thrifty Sunday. I love your wall. It looks just great. Congratulations on a wonderful job.

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  2. I love your gallery. I need to use painters tape. My husband never gets stuff hung exactly where I like it. I love how yor framed out the light switch.

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    1. Thanks! Yes, hanging things is so tricky! There may or may not be an extra hole behind one of my frames from where I flubbed up. Ha! ;)

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  3. This looks beautiful. Love the pop of pink with the painting. I'm a big fan of the black frames. We used these with with backgrounds for our stairway family portraits. My husband didn't use painter's tape, he just measured each one. It also came out very nice. Stopping by from Motivational Monday.

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    1. Thanks! Yes, I've always been black frame lover, especially with white mats. It's like eyeliner for pictures. ;)

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  4. This turned out so well! I LOVE the pop of pink and that you framed out the light switches and thermostat, you can't even tell they're there. Great job!

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    1. Huge thanks to you for the inspiration!!! :)

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  5. That's a beautiful wall! I love the pink painting. It's a great accent! I am a fan of black and gray. I used them for our gallery wall!

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  6. Looks great! When I do my photo walls, I use contact paper as a template! :-)

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    1. That's a *genius* idea! I've seen the wrapping/shipping paper idea all over the place, but it rolls up while I'm trying to cut it (so frustrating!), so I tried the painters tape instead. I wish I would have thought of contact paper! So much better. Next time! :) Thanks!

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  7. This looks great. Thanks for sharing your ideas.

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  8. I'm going to make my gallery next weekend, so I find your advices soo precious! Thank you!

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  9. I love how this turned out!! And so smart to hide the light switch and thermostat with frames, I totally didn't even notice until you mentioned that! I love all the person touches with the sweet pictures. :) Thanks for sharing it with us at Motivational Monday! Hope to see you again on Sunday! :)

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    1. Thanks so much! I really lucked out to already have frames on hand that fit around the thermostat and switch perfectly!

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  10. This is one gorgeous gallery wall !
    I love the black and white them and the monogram - just perfect !
    ( and framing the thermostat is just genius )
    Thanks for sharing!

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  11. Your photo wall turned out just plain awesome! Love the M!

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    1. Thanks!!! I couldn't believe how inexpensive the M was at Joanns!

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  12. Love your gallery wall, Samantha! We have a wall with our thermostat and 4 more switches on it and it bugs me all. the. time! I should create a gallery wall around it! Thanks for sharing at our party... featuring you on Thursday :)
    Kendra @ www.joyinourhome.com

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    1. Thanks so much! It's amazing how well the frames camoflague the switches. Thanks for the feature--makes my day!

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  13. Your gallery wall looks wonderful! I love that you framed your light switch and thermostat...such a great idea!!!

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  14. This looks awesome! Love a good gallery wall!! Thanks for sharing at Fridays Unfolded! Featuring you this week :)

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  15. So excited to find this! It clicked for me! The tape is a brilliant idea to make sure it all fits and will look good. Can't wait to pull the frames together and try it.

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  16. I absolutely love how you put your wall together ~ it looks great! What paint colour do you have on your wall?

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    1. Thanks! The color is Benjamin Moore's Gray Owl reduced to 75%. We have Gray Owl in full strength in our living room, but lightened it a bit for the hallway since the hallway has no windows. Here's what it looks like in full strength. Hope it helps! It's a really great gray! http://littlebitsofhome.blogspot.com/2014/07/living-room-makeover-paint-plans.html

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  17. What size frames did you use? Also, what size is the letter you used? I LOVE this wall!!! I plan to copy for my hallway:)

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    1. Thanks!! The smaller frames are 4x6, 5x7, or an irregular size like the square one around the lightswitch or the circle one. The larger frames are 8x10's and the biggest frame is an 11x14. The painting frame and the letter are about 24" tall. Here's a link to the exact letter I bought. I spray painted mine, but you could modge podge a patterned paper on it, too, for a fun effect. Bonus points, if you use a 40% off coupon, it's only $6! Good luck with your wall, I know it will be gorgeous!

      http://www.joann.com/235in-paper-mache-letter-/xprd78856.html

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