Create a Stunning Gallery Wall on a Budget | Living Room Makeover

If you find yourself with a big blank wall and you want to put something there but you're just not sure what I am so glad this video found you. My name is Anastasia and in this video I'm going to show you step by step to creating your dream gallery wall that looks like a professional designer did it. Now this is achievable even for a beginner but just in case you do run into some hiccups along the way I'm also going to cover some solutions for those common predicaments. Let this be your guide to creating your Pinterest worthy gallery wall that you've been pinning for way too long. The very first step in creating your gallery wall is to collect your frames. My favorite place to get frames is thrift stores, yard sales, estate sales and I end up finding really beautiful good quality vintage ones at low prices. I can also find some really nice detailed gold ones which are my favorite. If I thrift frames that are not gold and are pretty drastically different then I will spray paint them first in like a dark brown color before I go in with a gold rub and buff. Some of my frames that are already gold but maybe they're just a touch too yellow gold or a little bit too orange I will just go right on top of that with some rub and buff. I like the European gold color and it doesn't change it drastically but it's just enough to change the tone of the gold and make the entire wall more of that muted gold that I prefer. Also keep in mind when you're collecting things for your gallery wall that you are not limited to just frames. You can collect artifacts or candle sconces to include in your gallery wall as well. Step two in creating your gallery wall is choosing your layout. So for me my gallery wall will be placed within a large section of box trim within my living room. So the first step that I'm going to take is measuring that space where I want my frames. This is extra important for someone who has a limited area where they can fit the frames because you want to make sure you don't choose too many frames to fit in that space. Once I've measured the dimensions I'm going to use painter's tape to mark out those dimensions on my floor. Now stay with me I know this sounds crazy but this is the best way to test out your gallery wall before you put it up on the wall. So once you've got your space on the floor marked out you can then start laying your frames on the floor to test out different layouts until you find one that you're happy with. For this part there is a huge component of play so let yourself play with this. Let it be creative and don't put too much pressure on yourself because you're really not committing to anything yet. You're not putting holes in the walls so I like to just throw down some frames and switch them around and move them out until I feel like it looks visually balanced and I'm pretty happy with it. Having frames that have different textures and a few different sizes can add a lot of visual interest to a gallery wall as well so don't be afraid to collect an eclectic mix of frames. I also like how in my gallery wall I included two oval frames so it kind of softens the look a bit and it's not just one big rectangle party. You know what I mean? Step three in creating your gallery wall is the fun part and that's selecting your artwork for your frames. So once I've laid down my layout that I'm happy with I want to go ahead and use my artwork that I already have and just lay them out in the frames to see what I'm working with and where I'm starting at. So I have some mats that I'm putting on some of my frames that fit and I have a couple pieces of artwork that I cut out from some thrifted art books. Art books are so awesome because they're usually just a dollar or two at the thrift store and they're filled with so many beautiful prints that you can just cut out and frame. Now that you've got your layout you've got some existing mats and if you had any artwork collected you've got that down too. Now's the time that you want to take a picture of this layout from above so that you can remember how it looks and two so that you can put this into Canva and play around with the artwork digitally. I'll explain more about that in just a minute. Make sure you measure your frame or your mat sizes also and take note of that so that when you go to order your artwork you know what sizes to get. So now back to Canva. Canva is a really easy to use graphic design tool and it's free so just go to canva.com and upload that picture that you took of your layout to Canva. So now that that image is in Canva we can drag and drop artwork onto each of those frames to play around with the collection of artwork before we get them printed. So in my case I didn't have a lot of artwork to work with so I had to go online and find downloadable art prints from Etsy or from open access art museum galleries online before I could have them printed. Etsy has tons of beautiful downloadable art prints and I will link the ones that I used below. Once you've downloaded those art prints that you like you can upload those to Canva and then start dragging and dropping them on top of those frames and switch them around try different art pieces. This is a very non-committal way to test out how your art is going to look in the gallery before you commit to buying them. I'll make sure the artwork that I used today are all linked in my description. I also made a note in Canva about what sizes each of those frames are so that when I go to order the art I remember what size to get. So once you're completely happy with your selection of artwork and how it looks in Canva you can go ahead and download that from your chosen website. Now what I like to do is get my artwork printed at Walmart. They have photo services you can order online or go in store and sit at one of their photo kiosks. They have always printed beautifully for me at Walmart and they're very affordable compared to some other similar photo services at other places I've tried. So I highly recommend going to Walmart's website and getting them printed there. Step four is assembling your artwork into your frames. Once your artwork has been printed you are ready to go ahead and put them in your frames with your chosen mat if you decide to do that. Now this is about the point where you may start to run into some little predicaments and I'm going to talk about those predicaments in this video and address some ways to fix them. So make sure you stick around to hear how to fix those so that the process of creating your gallery wall can go smoothly. Step five is to hang your frames. Now the easiest way that I have found to do this is to trace out all of your frames onto some paper and cut them out. You can also make a note on the paper whether the frame was vertical or horizontal. Simply use some tape to tape up the papers onto the wall. I like to leave about one and a half to two inches of highways between the frames. That's just my personal preference. I love this method of using the paper cutouts because this gives the freedom to play around with the layout some more once it's up on the wall. You may have loved it on the floor but maybe when it's on the wall you have some different feelings about it. Maybe you want to switch some frames out or spread them out more than you had them on the floor. This method gives you the freedom to do that super easily. Next you're going to mark where the nail hole needs to be on the paper. So I just like to measure on my frame where the the little hook on the back of the frame lands and then mark that onto the paper so I know exactly where to put my nail. All of my frames are hung right into my sheetrock. I didn't get lucky enough to find a stud behind any of these frames. So my two favorite things to use to hang frames is either a picture frame hanging kit and the hooks that come in that or monkey hooks. Both of these only put just a teeny tiny hole in your wall and can hold quite a bit of weight. Put the nail right through your paper and then take the paper down so you can start hanging your frames. When I was creating my gallery wall I definitely ran into a few predicaments that I didn't predict that I would run into. So to avoid that for you I want to tell you what those predicaments are and some ways to fix them. So number one you may turn over your frame and realize that there is no hanging hardware. It just has one of those kickstands. So what do you do in this situation? What I like to do is get my picture frame hanging kit and it comes with these hooks that can be attached to the back of the frame. Now if you have a wooden frame this will be super easy because they're nails that you just nail into the wooden frame. If your frame is plastic you will probably need to use a really tiny drill bit to drill pilot holes into the plastic first before you can hammer it in those tiny nails. I will link the picture frame hanging kit that I have so you can check that out if you need it. The second predicament you may run into is issues with the frame's kickstand. Some frames have a kickstand that are especially stubborn and just don't want to lay flat and this creates a problem when you hang it on your wall because the kickstand will actually push the frame out from the wall and the frame will not lay flush with the wall. So in this case you have a few options. You can either rip the kickstand off if you don't plan on using it in the future or you can find a frame that's the same size that doesn't have a kickstand and switch out the backs or you can simply cut a piece of cardboard and make a new back for the frame and use some tape to attach it and just like that your problem solved. Another predicament is if your frame doesn't have a backing at all or also doesn't have glass. This can be common in frames that you might drift. If you have a frame that doesn't have an existing back you can do the cardboard method for this as well by just cutting a piece of cardboard to size and attaching that to the back. If your frame doesn't have a way to attach it you can use some packing tape to hold it on there securely. If your frame does not have glass you can either find a frame that you're not using that's the same size and use the glass from that frame or you can just skip the glass altogether. I've done that for several of the frames in my house. Some people even do it on purpose even though they have the glass just as a stylistic choice so I wouldn't worry too much about that. And lastly if you have a frame with odd dimensions. So if your frame doesn't have your typical picture sizes like 8 by 10, 11 by 14 and so on then you will need to find a solution for that. One way is to print a photo that's bigger than your frame and cut it down to size. But if that's not an option for you you can also make a custom mat and that's what I did for one of my frames. So I used a piece of foam core board and I cut it down to the exact dimensions of the frame using a really sharp knife. So once I've cut out my mat shape with the foam board I'm gonna wrap that in the linen fabric that I thrifted. It was a thrifted shower curtain and I'm using some Gorilla Glue adhesive spray to spray that on the mat. Let it get a little tacky and then press it onto your linen and wrap the edges around. This is a super easy beginner DIY that did not take very long at all so you can really do this for any of your frames even if they're not a strange dimension. And it's now one of my favorite frames because I love that linen mat look. If you happen to run into any hiccups along the way that I have not covered within this video please feel free to comment down below and I will do my best to offer a solution for you. I hope this video helps you achieve your gorgeous gallery wall dreams. Please subscribe if you found this helpful and let me know in the comments if this video gave you the inspiration you needed to get started making your dream gallery wall. Thank you guys so much for watching and I'll see you next time. Bye guys! I'm trying to talk so I can keep my nostrils because like when I talk I hold my head a certain way. This is the ice cream truck. Art books are so awesome. Why do I have trouble saying that word? So I'll be covering. We'll be talking about those. Oh my goodness.