Gallery Wall

When Dan and I first rented our current apartment back in July we were both exceedingly happy and surprised by the size of the living room.  Now that we have been in our home several months we have nearly finished organizing and arranging everything.  See the nearly complete tour here.

The living room was large enough to split into a lounge area for the TV and couch and chairs and still have room for a dining room table that seats six, plus a nice IKEA sideboard.  That amount of space is crazy rare in tiny NYC apartments and we are truly grateful to have it.

Because we have such a large room we also have huge blank walls.  We painted the primary wall a blueish-gray (see that here) and then we did literally nothing else to any of the walls in that room.

This photo was taken in September '14

The left wall works great for displaying decorations and lights but is otherwise totally blank.

By November I planned to create a gallery wall on the left side of the room by the table and I gathered all the pieces I hoped to hang there (they took awhile to accumulate).

At the beginning of December, Amy and Tim (Dan's cousin's and our wedding photographers) sent us the incredibly nice black and white canvas print from the wedding and since that was our biggest piece, I started plotting out the arrangement on the wall using Christmas wrapping paper (why not?) and painters tape.  It was a highly technical procedure.

Dan and I collaborated to fill the fun swooped frame.  He drew the pictures of the tree and Brooklyn Bridge and I made the pressed flower arrangements (I pressed those flowers when I was in high school! they are at least 10 years old).

The wall progressed over the last couple of weeks and with our trip to Hobby Lobby in Kansas we got a nice piece to hang adjacent to the canvas to balance the wall.  It was 50% off and pretty much perfect.

Mandy picked the cute "be" phrases when she was here at Thanksgiving and they pulled everything together.   

The mini chalkboards I got from Amazon and are perfect for seasonal changes.

I've spent the last three weeks working on my embroidery piece.  I hand drew the design and then just did whatever I felt like with color and stitch style.  It is my first completed attempt.  My mom showed me the embroidery basics back in July and now I'm hooked.

The plan was to put it on the gallery wall but it ended up being a bit to small for the space so we swapped it for the wreath that Mandy made and I purchased from her Etsy shop (Hopscotch and Honey).  It was meant to be.  Fits perfectly. 

I wish I had a good camera that showed the wall better in the context of the room.  The dining room table is right below this and the blue/gray wall to the right pulls out the blue in the wreath flowers.

Some things we learned from this process: 1)  Don't be symmetrical.  Although even steven is definitely my tendency with decorating, it looks more natural and cohesive if you don't use all squares and balance everything.  2) Dan is a wiz with using hammers and drills if NO ONE is watching him.  If I am in the room he hammers like he has no thumbs.  If I'm not breathing down his neck he can hammer like a carpenter.  Maybe I'm the problem?  He hung the chalkboard in the kitchen last weekend perfectly centered and perfectly level in one attempt while I waited nervously in the other room.