Christmas Wall Gallery

by Kimberly on December 6, 2016

Just for fun, we’re going to do another countdown – this time for Christmas/Holiday posts. Our top 3 Christmas/Winter Holiday posts will appear these three weeks before the winter holiday – plenty of time to get creative before your celebration! We start with the #1 most popular Winter holiday post, Kimberly’s Christmas Wall Gallery.

Alright people, for those who know me personally, you know how excited I was to finally have a custom-built floating sideboard installed in our dining room. Our house is on the small side, so no matter where you are standing on the main floor, this wall is in view. Now that the sideboard is in place, I’ve been able to decorate the room around it. So this marks the first year of a new holiday tradition – showcasing holiday photos from years gone by, using my dining room wall as the canvas. And here it is, our first annual Christmas wall gallery!

By: Kimberly

The steps for this one are fairly straightforward!

Step 1: Gather up your frames! I have a massive collection of frames, so I started there first. I have lots of black, white and gold frames, and even a few silver, but what I was missing was brown frames. I really wanted this gallery to have a rustic, almost vintage feel, so headed to Pottery Barn to do a little shopping. I ended up purchasing three brown frames which each came with two mattes (a rustic-looking burlap matte and a traditional ivory matte).

Step 2: Create your gallery… on the floor. I spent about 15 minutes playing around with my frames. I decided to use a fresh wreath as the centre, and built the gallery around that. I also included a few round mirrors. I used a measuring tape to indicate how long the sideboard is.

Step 3: Based on your frames, order your prints. This took me a bit of time as I had to go through quite a few folders on the computer to find some of my favourite photos. Luckily, I already had an 8×10 from Robin’s first Christmas and a 4×6 from when she sat on Santa’s lap at the mall last year.

Step 4: Adhere frames to the wall. I used Command Wall Hanging stickers (made by 3M) because I didn’t want to put any new holes into the wall.

For the wreath, I used a Command hook. Thankfully, the layout I settled on hides the 3 existing holes.

After hanging the wreath, I started hanging the frames around it, working from the centre and outwards. I ended up adding two more frames and not using all of the mirrors. I also ended up replacing one of the Pottery Barn brown frames with a black Ikea frame that I had hung on the wall during the winter last year. It was already set to go with a photo of Robin in the snow.

I spent about an hour hanging the frames and mirrors and I’m so thrilled with how the gallery turned out. It makes our house feel so much more festive and gives the rustic Christmas look I was hoping for. Here’s the view from our front door

And in case you are wondering where some of the decor is from, here’s a list:

Brown frames with burlap mattes: Pottery Barn
Black frames with 4×6 white matte (bottom left): Pottery Barn
Black frame with white 12×18 white matte (bottom right): Ikea
Black mirrors (from a set of 5): Target
Green Trees: Target
Advent calendar: Target
Red candle holders and candles: Pottery Barn

Since I’m totally immersed in holiday decorating right now, I gathered up some of my favourite Christmas gallery walls from other bloggers. So many great ideas out there!

Jen of Tatertots & Jello updates her existing wall gallery for the holiday season. Check out her Halloween version too!

Here’s a tutorial from Vixenmade on how to create a fun and colourful holiday gallery. She includes links to the printable art she purchased, as well as a tutorial to make the adorable glitter reindeer art.

Here’s a more sophisticated look from An Oregon Cottage. Their “favourite Christmas decorations” post also includes a tutorial on how to make this beautiful vintage sheet music wreath.

Happy Looks Good On You shows you how to make your own metallic reindeer art. We’re loving this eclectic gallery and DIY art tutorial!

Madigan Made hits it out of the park with this clipboard wall. It’s modern, bright and bold. You could use photos instead of prints, or a mix of the two. And clipboards could be pretty neat on the wall year round, and would make swapping out the photos super easy!

Here’s a cool idea from I Should Be Mopping The Floor. If you send out a family photo on your holiday card every year, stick those cards into frames along with your other holiday favourites!