Building a Gallery Wall

Get inspiration for building a gallery wall of your own in any room with these pictures, hacks, and resources for reflecting your style in 9 frames.

If your Instagram and Pinterest feeds are as girly and saturated with home decor inspo as mine, you're probably familiar with the concept of a gallery wall. If not, it's a group of artistic and decorative pieces arranged in a grid or other type of pattern...on a wall! In my home office tour post, I shared a little bit of what went into creating the gallery wall over my desk but I'll go more in depth here. Mine was inexpensive to make and I'm so very pleased with how it turned out that I thought I'd share a few tips with y'all.

This spray paint has been my BFF while decorating my home. I'm nowhere near finished making this space my own yet but have already used it to customize curtain rods, a decorative tray, and the picture frames in this gallery wall, just to name a few things. It's a very inexpensive way to achieve a glam look and feel in your space.

Spray paint is pretty self-explanatory but here is my process in case you are curious: I removed the glass and matting from each frame then laid them out on a drop cloth with each one spaced so that I could easily spray all sides. After spray painting and allowing them to dry, I placed "artwork" in each frame followed by the backing and they were ready to hang. I put artwork in quotation marks because these obviously aren't Picasso-level pieces but each is meaningful to me--which I think is one of the integral aspects of a gallery wall. It should be personalized to you and your space! I incorporated ankara fabric I purchased from a local store as well as a print of Africa as nods to my beloved heritage. I also included some of my favorite motivational pieces of scripture. Lastly, I added #girlboss because this is my home office, after all. I gotta get sh*t done! Like a typical corporate worker bee, I printed these all out on a work printer...I know I'm not the only one that does that, right?? If I am then *shhhh!*

This project doesn't take any advanced skill level or specialty tools to complete. I used the hammer, nails, level, scissors, and measuring tape from my little pink toolkit (linked below). To assemble the gallery wall, I started by hanging the center frame then worked my way out from there, marking the desired position of each one with pencil. I left one inch of space between each frame on every side. This might not be the best approach, depending on your configuration but since I was working with nine frames in a 3 by 3 layout, it is what worked in this case. I do want to point out that a gallery wall can be composed of many different shaped and sized objects--not just framed graphics. These are just some basic tips. I already have visions swirling in my head for eclectic gallery walls in my living room (think family photos and knick knacks) and cocktail parlor (think champagne and cocktail themed graphic art) and can't wait to bring them to life! The paint and other materials I used are linked below. The frames seem to only be available in store and Michaels has 70% off sales and coupons right now so all the better.

Frames (8x8 size) | Spray Paint | Toolkit

I hope this is helpful and inspirational to you. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thanks for reading!