As of today, my current photo count on my phone is 43,000 images in my photo library. In today's day and age with a camera so easily accessed at our fingertips, the photos add up. While about half of those may be pointless pictures of a fancy meal I ate or a quick selfie when I was having a decent hair day, my photo library now holds some of my most precious and cherished pictures taken of the people I love the very most. I am a stay at home mom to three children, five and under, so I have endless moments and opportunities to capture so many moments that I never want to forget.
Because I am a self-proclaimed picture hoarder, I was searching hard for a solution to my problem of having so many photos and not knowing how to display them. I have my main entry way hallway who's walls have been completely empty the entire eight years we have lived in our home because I could just not figure out what to put there. But to my delight, inspiration struck like lightning one random day and that's when I knew what I would do with the space. A gallery wall. But not just like a cute-sy little collage. I wanted my whole entire wall, from floor to ceiling, to be covered in pictures.
Step 1. Get the frames
After being struck with inspiration, my next big task was to find enough frames to fill the entire wall. I made an hour road trip to my favorite thrift store of all time so that I could ransack their frame section.
When I arrived, I saw that it just so happened that the day I was there shopping, all frames were marked at 50% off. It was fate. I rolled up my sleeves, put my hair into a pony tail, got down on my hands and knees and just started rummaging for every single chestnut colored frame that I could find.
I ended up with a tub overflowing of nearly fifty frames in sizes 8x10 or 5x7. The 8x10 frames were fifty cents each, after the day's discount. The 5x7 frames were a quarter. My grand total for my entire gallery wall came in just under $25 for all of my frames. Every thrift store employee questioned my sanity for buying so many frames, but I was determined to make this vision come to life.
Step 2. Hang the frames
So here's the part of my entire DIY project that might be a little controversial to some. I did not make a predetermined layout of my frames before I started hanging them on the wall. I just started at the bottom of the wall near the floor, selected my frames that I thought would look nice to one another and then I just started "hanging from the heart." I just made up the layout as I went. And somehow it all worked.
Another controversial method that I used that everyone may think I am nuts for doing was using a very small tack nail to hang each one of my pictures on... I know, I know, that's like fifty holes in the wall. But I have never been a fan of command strips and I am fully capable of using a little spackle and a putty knife to cover up my little holes later on down the road if I ever choose to change up that space.
Step 3. Select the pictures
After a lot of careful thought for arrangements and then multiple searches around the house for my hammer when my kids would run off with it, I somehow brought the vision in my head to life. I had arranged my frames row by row until I had reached the ceiling. Then I wrapped frames around the bench cutout in my hallway, back down to the ground. In all, this took me a couple of hours to complete.
I honestly think the hardest part of this project was selecting the fifty photos that I would use to display on my new gallery wall out of my 43,000 photo camera roll. Once I did, I took my photos to my local print shop and then placed them into their new frames.
Before & After
And there you have it!
My newly beloved gallery wall. My own personal shrine that holds so many memories with my family is now on display for all to see. It has become a show stopping focal point in our home. All who visit our home always stop right in front of this wall and pause to look at each and every photo. It makes me so happy. Because that to me is the whole point of a gallery wall. It's on display for all to see. While I dearly love my new frame display, I still wonder what I do with the other 42,950 photos remaining on my camera roll. The thought dawned on me that I do have a whole other blank wall just right across the hallway. I think it too is begging to be filled...
Creator: Courtney
Instagram: @the22milehome
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