In the late 2000s I kept a personal mom blog called Nest Bliss. I reviewed books, wrote about the house and the girls, and was even in the Wall Street Journal. These posts are from then: light, young, a mom in her late twenties. I have edited them to stand on their own.
Project 2 – Picture Ledge or Gallery Wall First let’s just go ahead and talk about the elephant in the room.
I needed something above the TV that felt like a mantle so this picture ledge was installed just after I moved in a few years ago. It is the number one thing people ask me how to do at home (number 2 coming tomorrow).
Obviously, there are loads of variations, if I had a big empty wall I would do three across the entire length of the wall and light it with gallery lights and go crazy changing it around all the time.
I think Martha Stewart and Pottery Barn are good places for gallery wall inspiration. Right now ours is corralling my family photos but I can feel my collection of Japanese Wood Block Prints making their way there soon.
I would also add that I have fun with ours and change it around; I could spend $$$ trying to create the perfect height and balance but then it would be way harder to justify changing out the photos on a regular basis.
You need essentially three pieces of wood: a 1x2, a 1x3, and a 1x4.
Steps: 1. Prime and paint or stain all the pieces after cutting them to the desired length, or having them cut down at the hardware store where you buy them.
2. Attach the 1x4 to the wall.
You could use adhesive I suppose but I would recommend keeping in mind that this is holding heavy items with glass so I used wood screws. 2.
Screw the 1x3 horizontally into the top of the 1x4 to create a shelf – see photo for clarification. 3.
Screw the 1x2 vertically to the front of the 1x3 to create a lip to hold your art – see photo for clarification. 4.
Fill holes with wood filler and touch up with paint. DONE!
Should take less than 2 hours and since you are buying existing cuts of lumber they will all be easy to find and cheap – ours cost about $10 total for all of the wood. Check out all the projects in this category by clicking here .
Has anyone else built something similar?