If you were with me last week, this morning’s “Pinspiration Monday” feature may look a bit familiar…Click back here for a full refresher, but I’ll just jump to the point and tell you that, after posting the room below in last week’s “All in the details,” I couldn’t help but feel inspired.
That wooden gallery grid was just too darn genius not to attempt in our home. So over the weekend, I grabbed some lumber from the lumber merchant, my drill, a couple cans of stain and my hubby to do some wood working.
I chose to go with three 2×1″ pieces of oak wood. Two were kept in their original 4 foot length to be hung horizontally and parallel to one another, while a third was sawed in half (by the helpful guys at Lowe’s) to act as my two vertical supports. The plan was to construct a lattice-like grid, as seen in my Pinspiration image, with the two long horizontal pieces of wood screwed on top of the two vertical short pieces – That way, prints could be hung from the wood via little snap hangers.
We stained the fronts of the wood (in Minwax Golden Oak, if you’re curious) and let them dry overnight, and then grabbed our measuring tape, pen, hardware and drill. If you look back to my source image, you’ll see that the vertical posts extend MUCH farther than the center of the horizontal ones, so I decided to mimic that asymmetrical vibe. My measurements are ALL over the place (ex. the vertical slats are 11 inches in from each side, top horizontal slat is 3 inches from the top and bottom horizontal slat is 8 inches in from the bottom), but don’t let that overwhelm you if you try this at home. I say just play around with your placements until you get it somewhere that you like and then mimic the measurements on both sides.
To connect everything after the measuring and marking, we predrilled some holes from the back (so no screws showed from the front) and then set the flathead screws. We decided the best way to hang it since it would be supporting the weight of art, was to use some nice black finishing screws from the front. So we also predrilled those holes while we were at it.
A little measuring and eyeballing later on the wall, and we were all done. Oh, and I decided to put this up in my studio on the black wall for maximum effect – A great place for me to keep my rotating collection of favored prints and photographs.
Moment of truth…Time to fill it up with art. I picked up a four-pack of wooden snap hangers from Target and carefully sandwiched some of my favorite pieces to be hung (more on those in a moment). I’ll be honest, I wasn’t ENTIRELY sure how much I was going to love this contraption we had made – But after hanging the art and stepping back, I was completely 100% sold. I love it.
I particularly love how SIMPLE it is to hang the art. Attaching pieces to the hangers is too simple for words, and a quick turn of the metal hook made it a cinch to loop over the horizontal slat in the grid. I am really excited by how versatile the system is, and how I can rotate the art without breaking a sweat.
But speaking of the art…Let’s chat about what I decided to hang. Of course, the obvious color scheme of teal and yellow is a given, although unintentional – The “Be Brave” print I KNEW was going to be hung on the grid, but the others were sitting in my closet, waiting for their own special spot – This being it.
Oh, how I adore my new “Be Brave” print…It’s sort of a funny story actually. Not even an HOUR after posting here about never winning anything, I learned via Twitter that I was the lucky reader winner of my very own “Be Brave” print (made by Jess LC) via Anne, of Anne the Adventurer. Since being named the winner, Anne and I have been chatting behind the scenes, bouncing ideas off of one another and it’s been SUCH a fun collaboration. I can’t gush enough about the incredible support of the blogging community as a whole…But anyway, I’ve been a HUGE fan of Jess LC for a while and have always wanted this print, but could never quite click my mouse on “order now.” HUGE thanks to Anne for making this beautiful piece of art mine. (P.S. Order your own from Jess here!)
The “Some like it hot” print is something I found and printed offline, but I love the color scheme and design. Simple, to the point and fun. The chinese print is a piece that my in-laws brought back for me after visiting John’s sister, who was working overseas. I’m so happy to have finally found the perfect spot to show it off.
And don’t worry about the white Ribba framed art that once lived on the back wall – The two pieces are now hung on the minty side. I think they play nicely off the new gallery grid.
So ends the story of my new gallery grid – Not the EASIEST project I’ve ever undertaken (and a BIG “Thank you!” goes out to John for being the calming force behind said project), but I couldn’t be happier with the finished look…
