Tips to Create a Gallery Wall of Family Photos.

If you’re like me. we love taking photos of the kids, keeping memories alive and creating a life journey in pictures.

Unfortunately, in this digital age we don’t get to share our favourite photos with the world as they get stuck in our phones or laptops.

To me a photo wall is the perfect way for us to fill our home with memories of the ones we love. 

Ok, to be honest there is one drawback. Having to clean the gallery wall from dust is not one of my favourite chores. But as I dust the photos it takes me back to the time the kids were babies or the family holiday where we had the best laughs.

Adding a gallery wall is not just restricted to one area in your home. Think hallways, living rooms, dining rooms, staircases, family room or office.

I have learnt a few tricks along the way and share them with you here.

Styling

Once you have an idea of where you want to create a wall of beautiful memories, it’s time to decide on the style.

It’s important for your gallery wall to compliment the styling in your home. Do you have a modern, vintage, coastal, boho, farmhouse styled home?

Look at getting photo frames to suite your styling. Choose frames in a mix of colors or in one color. You can also select a mix of frames with textures or all frames the same.

Do you like frames in different sizes and shapes styled in free form?

Or would you prefer frames in the same size and shape in a grid?

Will you be adding any art work to your gallery wall or only photos?

Maybe you are creating a gallery wall on shelves and are adding a few accessories or small plants.

From Pinterest and Google.

Choosing photos.

Styling sorted, now it’s time to select your photos for printing. (This is one of my favourite parts, looking through all our family photos!)

Tip: When printing your photos, remember the orientation. For a symmetrical photo wall, print all your photos either horizontal or vertical.

Also consider if your photos will be black and white or full color.

Choosing a layout

Play around with a few layouts before hanging your photos.

 Lay the frames on the floor and play around with patterns. This helps to see which frames and pictures go well together or if there is something you want to change. Maybe the colors or textures of the frames don’t complement each other and you need to look for other frames, artwork or accessories.

Time to hang your pictures.

There’s nothing worse than spending the time and hanging all your pictures to realise that you don’t like the design or have made a mistake.

Take a bit of time beforehand and trace all your frames onto paper. Blu tac the cut-outs onto the wall to make sure that you like the layout. This way you can make sure that you are 100% happy before attaching all your frames to the wall. If you are not sure, take a few days to look at the wall, as you walk past it during the day and change as needed till you are satisfied.

Remember to keep the spacing between all your frames or artwork the same throughout your gallery wall. The gallery wall should also be evenly spaced between the ceiling and floor.

Tools to hang your pictures.

A small level will help you hang your pictures frames straight.

Nails or command strips?

With my first gallery wall, I used nails. When I changed my room design and decided to move the gallery wall, it was very time consuming to remove all the nails and also fills the holes and repaint the wall. Not to mention the constant straightening of the frames or telling the kids to be careful not to bump the pictures. Lesson Learnt!

Second time around, we used command strips. Easy to apply, the pictures stay straight and if we need to, are easy to take off again.

If you choose command strips, look at the maximum weight of the command strips and buy according to your frame weight.

Start with the focal point, centre piece of the gallery and work out from there.  

Keep the level close at hand to make sure you hang your photos straight. Remember to take a step back and make sure that you are happy with the placements and spacing as you hang each picture.

That’s our tips. We hope that it makes your life easier hanging your gallery wall.

Take care and enjoy creating your wall of precious memories!

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