Photo Collage Bomb

I’m currently in the demanding throws of a big, much-more-tedious-than-I-thought-it-would-be project so we’re going back a few months to a project I did that didn’t turn out quite as I wanted it to.  You see, we’ve had this big, blank wall in our dining area that has just been screaming for some something to break it up: 

Fortunately, the diy hoarder inside me has a stock pile of random frames waiting to be spainted (spray painted, yes I made it up) and found a wall home.  Here are the chosen ones for this particular endeavor:After much scheming, I decided to copy the incredible John and Sherry over at Young House Love, and put up a collage very similar to the one in their first home’s living room.  I even stole their magazine monogram idea, except I made mine in Photoshop.

The first step was to spaint the mats in each frame white so that they’d all match.  For a couple of the thrifted frames, this involved removing their paper backing to get inside: 

 Side note:  Since the glass and mat were held in with nails, it wasn’t necessary to replace the backing…since they hang with their backs towards the wall, no one is any wiser.

The next step was getting all of the frames the same color.  Aqua, white, oil-rubbed bronze, silver…I went back and forth, back and forth until I finally just called it and settled on silver.  I wanted a semi-shiny, brushed on silver though so instead of going with my norm, spray paint, I headed on over to Michael’s (with a coupon of course) where I picked up some Liquid Leaf and hand painted those babies with it…aaaand hated it.  (You quick ones might’ve noticed the fast one I was trying to pull…I switched out two of the above frames I thought I was going to use for two more thrifted frames shown in the pic above.  I just couldn’t bring myself to paint the pretty white ones another color.)

It was much to matte and darker than I had in mind.  Boo.  Lucky for me, I had a can of silver spaint in my stash so they each got a quick coat.  A few hours of drying time and some photos later and up they went:

Final verdict?

I hated it. I don’t like the silver…it looks cheap and doesn’t give the punch of flavor that wall needed.  I’m still on the fence about the layout…I might add some more frames or just change it altogether.  “Stay tuned” would be the only thing left to say about it at this point.

However, it is worth mentioning what did work during this whole semi-failed process.  To figure out the exact placing of each frame, I traced each one onto a piece of newspaper, cut the template out, and taped it up on the wall until I was satisfied.  (Sorry, can’t find the picture of said process.)  Then, to hang them in the exact spots I took a note from The Scrap Shoppe blog and made my own hanging tool out of some scrap wood which worked incredibly well and will now be used every time I decide to puncture a wall with any sort of nailed-in decor.

.           .           .

Like I said above, stay tuned for this wall will change as soon as I make up my mind on the direction I want to go.  As for the present, I’d better get back to the surprise nursery project that’s testing my patience.  Details to come on that soon! 

Have a fantastic weekend!