The Adorn those for to walls

If the sight of blank walls unnerve you, then you must be feeling the beginnings of a love affair with wall décor. While there are infinite ways of dressing up those vertical spaces, the one thing that most people think of using to populate their walls with is art.

It seems pretty easy to just have your favorite art works framed, and hung up on hooks on the wall. But there’s actually a more studied approach to hanging up art. It first begins with deciding what to display, how to arrange them on the wall, how high or low they should be, and of course, the interplay of art pieces with its immediate surroundings and neighboring furniture. Let’s take it step by step.

1. Pick the photos, prints, or artworks you want to put up.

This is a very personal preference. Do you love looking at your family photos? Do you have beautiful portraits that need to be displayed? Have you downloaded free (and rights-free) works online or bought prints from Etsy-based artists? Do you collect posters or graphic design prints? Do you frequent art fairs and love supporting emerging artists’ careers? Are you a self-confessed patron of the arts and have invested in a few important pieces? Your answers to these questions will determine what kind of wall adornments you eventually put up.

2. Do a trial layout of your wall arrangement.

Once you have a collection of pieces for your walls, you can lay them out on the floor to see the arrangement that works for you. A trick that I always recommend to my clients is to trace out these pieces on manila paper, cut them out, and hang up templates on the wall with masking tape. This allows you to see the actual dimensions of your artworks next to each other, and gives you freedom to rearrange them in the manner most pleasing to you, without puncturing your walls with holes.

3. Best to hang wall art at eye level, or a few inches about furniture pieces.

Many people make the grave mistake of hanging up art too high. Incorrectly placed art actually affects how big, tall, or wide a space looks. If you have high ceilings and low furniture, art hung too high highlights the discrepancy, creating an unwelcome “floating” feeling, and also leads to strained necks. The general rule is that you should place artwork (or a grouping) at eye level. Since we all have different eye levels, work with a range of 5” to 9” above major pieces of furniture. If you have more than two art pieces to hang, lay them out first and get their collective center. Measure the center of the grouping on the wall to be at eye level (if no pieces of furniture will be placed under it), or at least 5” above the biggest furniture or item underneath it.