- Over the past few years, my gallery wall has grown
from this, to this, to this.
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In this video, I wanna walk you through my process
for putting together this like very maximalist gallery wall
and give you some tips for if it's something
that you wanna create for yourself, let's get into it.
So I guess, let's talk about why for a hot minute,
like why invest all this time
and effort and money into pictures on my wall?
This is my office, this room that my gallery wall is in
and I previously had, as you saw, smaller gallery walls.
I really like having art on my walls.
I find it inspiring to have things designed
by other designers and artists,
'cause I'm a designer myself
and I love a good inspirational message as well.
I find it like a really inspiring environment to work in.
As I have this big room
and I was looking at this big, white wall here
beside me one day, I just realized, I was like,
why don't I just fill that one with art as well?
Like, why don't I just commit and go for it
and like embrace this whole gallery wall concept and do it.
So I did, and I lent into this maximalist view of things.
Usually I am more minimalist when it comes to home decor.
So yes, this was an interesting choice for me
but I have loved it.
I find it really inspiring to work in here.
It's just, yeah, a great, creative space.
I don't know, we all have our things right, that we like.
This art on the walls is what makes
this office space feel like mine.
And yeah, it helps me get more work done.
So that's the why, and I'm sure you'll have your own reasons
for wanting to do something similar yourself
or maybe you're just interested,
but let me give you some tips for putting one together.
And we'll start by talking about how to develop
somewhat of a theme that can run through
all of the pieces on your wall.
It might not be immediately obvious as you look at my wall
because there is like lots of different art styles
and things on there, but there is a theme running through it
and I think that's helped it feel more cohesive
than perhaps it would if I hadn't thought about that at all.
I think it helps it work together
and not be too overwhelming in the room, but there's two,
like, I held up three fingers and I said two,
there's two main things I consider when buying a piece.
One is, I have a color scheme for my wall.
It's black, white or gray, like neutral tones.
Or if it's a color,
the accent is gonna be yellow, pink or blue.
I picked those colors
and that's what I've gone with throughout.
And I've tried to have one big piece on the wall,
at least one fully representing each color
so we can see my yellow Anthony Burrill here.
I've got my pink magnifique, that's fun to say.
And the pink, yes, yes, yes as well.
And then a little down there is the blue Anthony Burrill
to represent those colors.
And then those colors are coming out
in various other pieces on the wall too.
Keep a color scheme in mind when you're picking art,
colors that are gonna work together,
mine are quite bright tones.
Yeah, and that'll help tie things through.
And then the other theme that you can probably
very easily see on my wall is typography.
The theme is typography.
I think it could have worked to have more
like fine art style stuff in amongst wall as well
because they do have things like,
if I just turn my camera around, this print here,
this is a beautiful pink watercolor drawing
and that looks great worked into the wall too.
So I think I could work a little bit more of that in,
but yeah, mostly typography is what I've gone for
'cause that's my taste in art.
That's what I really like is good typography,
cool quotes, things like that.
So if you are planning a gallery wall,
I would advise you to think in advance
of what sort of stuff do I wanna have on here?
Are we going to stick to a theme?
Are we gonna just try and do it with, with random stuff?
Is it going to be paintings, typography, photos,
whatever it is, make a choice and then yeah, lean into it.
(gentle music)
Something else that can help your gallery wall
feel cohesive, especially when there's a bunch
of different styles of art on it
is the frames that you choose.
So as you can see the frames for mine,
I've gone with very simple frames.
They're usually either black, white or wood
and they're very like squared off.
Most of them, I've got a couple of different styles
where like this one is thick versus some thinner ones
but there's that common thread running through.
I don't have any super-like ornate frames
or silver frames, gold frames, things like that.
Most of my prints don't have a mat,
although some do, but yeah, the frame is another place
that I've tried to keep some sort of line
of connection running through throughout the wall.
Like I said at the start,
I've been growing this gallery wall essentially
for over three years now really,
and that's how I've enjoyed doing it.
I don't think it would be the same
if I just decided to make a gallery wall
and purchased all the art at once and boom, it all arrived.
I don't know, the way I prefer to collect art
from my wall is to buy it from artists
who I really admire, buy it as a souvenir
on a trip I've been on or like a cool shop that I saw.
I don't know, that's the approach I prefer to take
rather than buying from some of the like,
you know, mass art sites,
like a Red Bubble or something like that.
I guess I search for art through searching for the artist,
rather than the piece itself.
So I find an artist that I really like and admire,
and then I'll pick a piece of their art
that they sell that can best fit on my wall.
That's added to the like inspiring nature
of the wall for me, is knowing the story behind each print.
That's honestly made this wall feel a lot more special
for me as well, is knowing that like just remembering
who created each piece and where I came across it.
Like if I just spin around a little bit,
this flag right here
is one of my favorite things on my wall.
This, you'll think of something.
I saw this on my friend, Brent Galloway's Instagram.
And I just love this message.
It's like exactly what I need to hear whenever I'm stuck
and staring at my wall, like you know,
staring into space trying to think of something.
And this is from Oxford Pennant Company,
I believe is their name in the US and they're all handmade.
And so, yeah, I purchased that one as soon as I saw it
'cause I was like, I need that for my wall.
And that's how I like discovering art,
through things like this.
Side note, I also have a print from Brent on my wall.
This, create more consume less, was done by him.
(gentle music)
I've just moved you back a bit so that maybe
I can talk to you through, give you some pointers
of a couple of my favorite artists to buy prints from
and on my website on Charlimarie.com/shopmyoffice,
you'll be able to get links
to a lot of the art that's on my walls.
Yeah, if there's anything that catches your eye
that you wanna get for yourself.
Anthony Burrill is a favorite of mine.
I have three of his pieces represented on my wall.
This one here as well, as well as the blue one that you saw,
this kind of kicked off the whole gallery wall.
I have always loved this print of his.
I have seen it like in photos
around the internet for many, many, many years.
And yeah, it was just a few years ago though
that I realized I was at a place
in my life where I could afford to buy
one of his prints for my own.
And so I did it, and now look what happened.
This one here is by Terence Tang, the stay humble.
I really love it, this has become quite an iconic
piece of lettering around the internet.
And this is another favorite here.
This creative process by Dan Edwards.
I don't think he sells it still, but he really should.
This one here, this, I like my desk messy
and my whiskey neat, is a great example of me
just wanting to make sure a certain artist
was represented on my wall.
Jessica Hische has been an inspiration
of mine as a designer for a very long time.
So I wanted to make sure that I had her I art around.
There's another one from her somewhere.
Oh yeah, this one up here, all this and more.
This one is by Telegram Paper Company.
And it is a illustration of a music venue,
an old music venue in London
that I went to for many wonderful shows.
And so, yeah, I love having that on my wall as well.
Hopefully you're seeing a theme here, right?
That it's like, it's all stuff that means something to me.
Just like with tattoos though,
like your art doesn't have to have a particular meaning
to you if you just like, it that's meaning enough, but yeah.
Having meaning is the approach
that I mostly take on my wall.
The, yes, yes, yes, though, that is definitely one
that is just 'cause I like it.
It's from, We Built This City, a shop in London
that I really like and I just thought
it was a cool graphic style
and the color theme really suited.
So yes, like I said, if you wanna know
about a specific piece on my wall, it's probably linked
on my website, but if it's not,
leave a comment, let me know
and I'll tell you where it's from.
But yeah, these have been collected over time
whenever something catches my eye,
that's been my approach to collecting.
(gentle music)
Let's look at this view for a second
while I talk about arranging the art,
which is obviously another really important part
of the gallery wall process.
Once you've got a collection together of art that you like,
you've gotta figure out how to hang it together.
And my biggest tip for you here,
thing to keep in mind is variety.
You don't wanna have like all of your big
pieces of art stacked together.
If you're going for this, like you know,
gallery wall look where it's sort of like
a bit all over the place, a bit mismatched,
nothing is like super even,
like at the top of my gallery wall
it doesn't make a perfect rectangle for example.
If that's the look you're going for,
which I think works out really well for a gallery wall.
Then yeah, you wanna be careful
of the balance of your pieces.
So that's why for example,
my Anthony Burrill prints are spaced out on my wall.
I have the yellow one here, the gray one here
and the blue one further down so that they're not all
right next to each other
because they are very similar prints
and they're the exact same size as well.
And so if I'm wanting to create variety,
I shouldn't have them right next to each other.
I think a good example of the balance
that I'm talking about here might be like this section.
So we've got the, you'll think of something, banner
as I like stand amongst my plants
and then we've got some color, some neutral,
some light ones around it.
So we've got the balance and color there.
It's not like a big group of dark prints together.
And then we're also playing with shape, right?
The, you'll think of something, is landscape.
We've got portrait above it
and it's not like perfectly aligning to the edge here
or here as well with the Coco print above it.
Basically, making a gallery wall
is like trying to make something feel
like it just like randomly ended up there.
But actually, it's very carefully considered.
You've very carefully considered the color
next to the one beside it next to the shape and all of that.
My advice to you as you're hanging or like deciding
on the arrangement of your pictures for your gallery wall,
is to lay them all out on the floor.
I have a rough idea of how big the wall is
that you're playing with
and then lay things out on the floor
and move them around
until it just starts to feel right to you.
A lot of people recommend cutting out
like paper in the same size as your art
and putting it on the wall to get that balance.
But I'd really advise you to make sure you're doing it
with the actual prints itself, 'cause it's not just
about the size of the art that we want balance with.
We also want balance with the color.
Some other things that I tried to do
for balance on my wall is put the full color pieces.
So pieces like the, yes, yes, the magnifique,
the Anthony Burrill for example,
those ones with the big colorful background,
I wanted to spread them out on the wall
because if I put all of the like color in one spot,
then the rest of the wall
would just feel like it was black and white.
Right, so yeah, it's like evenly spacing out
throughout the wall, the colorful pieces that I've had.
For this reason, I would recommend you get
like get quite a few pieces of art together.
Like maybe at least five together
before you start putting them up on the walls
so that you can start with the best balance possible.
I think as I look around my wall,
there's probably some things that I would change
if I was like starting from scratch with all of this art.
I might arrange things slightly differently
because I bought it at separate times
and I was like adding to it as I went
and all that, but that's okay.
That's just like part of building a gallery wall,
is building it up over time.
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So as you're laying all your prints
out on the floor to decide where they should go,
if something feels off to you,
if it doesn't feel quite right, my advice is to swap it out
for a print with an opposite color,
either the opposite like if it's a very bright,
white, airy print, swap it out for something darker
or something more colorful,
but also watch for frames as well.
It's something I've tried to do is not have too many
of like the black frames on my wall
next to each other for example,
'cause you wanna consider
the art itself as well as the frame.
And I dunno if we wanna get into
advice for choosing a frame color,
like just go with your gut on that.
I've tried to have a mix throughout my wall.
That's been the only way I've tried to do things.
I hope you enjoyed this tour through my gallery wall.
And that maybe you got some tips or inspiration
for putting together your own.
Definitely feel free to ask any questions you have
down below in the comments.
And like I said, you can check out my website to find links
to all the places that I have been able
to find to buy my art.
Some of the stuff I bought in person
and I'm not sure, yeah, where else you could find it,
but that is another tip for you.
Think of art as your souvenir on a trip,
instead of like a shot glass or some sort of shitty figurine
or something, have fun with it, support independent artists
with it as much as you can.
And hopefully you will build together a gallery wall
that you love as much as I love mine.
Thanks for watching and tuning in.
If you are new to my channel, please hit subscribe.
I make videos about design every single week.
So hopefully I'll see you back here
for the next one, bye.
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