I’m happy to report that the gallery wall in my living room is complete! As you may know, I’m on a mission to get art on the walls of my living room and office. A couple weeks ago I decided to create a large drama-filled gallery wall above my sofa in the living room.
The theme for this new gallery wall is wanderlust – places that I’ve visited and places where I want to go. One of my goals for the year is to travel a bit more. I’m always on the hunt for inspiration, and traveling seems to be a wonderful way to soak in the personality of a place. To help make my travel goals a reality, I’ve teamed up with Carnival Cruise Lines to share a few posts on IBC over the next few months. From cocktails to gallery walls, I’ll be sharing ideas inspired by some of the most beautiful travel destinations in the world.
To get my wanderlust gallery wall started, I used several photographs that I took myself (you may recognize the images from my trips to Ireland, California, and Oregon). I also purchased a couple on Etsy – I ordered the barn and train from Annie Bailey’s shop.
Ultimately, I’d like to fill the entire wall with my own photography. I’m hoping that will be possible with some of this year’s travel plans.
I’m all about creating artwork that is personal. Using my photography is a great way to create inexpensive artwork that is meaningful.
I use Photoshop Lightroom to edit all of my photos here on IBC. It’s a less -expensive and less-complicated version of Photoshop. I played around with the colors, brightness, and saturation to make my pictures look a bit more artistic and colorful. I also tried to choose pictures that would complement my current decor.
In the photo above the image on the left is the altered image. As you can see there is more color in the sky, the wood in the dock is more visible, the sky is more colorful near the horizon, and the image is sharper.
Once I had my photos printed (I used Walmart), I laid them out on the floor to get an idea of where I wanted them on the wall.
After that, I loaded up the frames, and in no time my gallery wall was complete.
I took a picture as I was making progress with filling my frames. Remember last time I mentioned I ordered bright white mats instead of the off-white ones included with the frame? Can you see the difference? I prefer the bright white mats so much better. It works better with the room and makes the photographs pop!
Now, for the finished wall!
What do you think?
I was a little bit nervous about using my own photography. However, once it’s matted and put behind a frame, it’s amazing how professional it looks.
What I particularly love about this gallery wall is that I can change it whenever I’d like. While I’m certainly pleased with the gallery wall as is, when I travel to new destinations, I can add new pictures to keep the wall feeling fresh and inspired.
Speaking of new destinations, as I was checking out the Carnival site, one of the places I’m most excited to visit is Belize (located in Central America off the Caribbean Sea). My friends and I were recently talking about planning a vacation, and Belize was one of our top choices. However, getting there is a little more complicated when you’re not arriving on a cruise ship. So, visiting with Carnival is going to be ah-mazing. Belize, puh-lease!
How are you loving my wanderlust gallery wall? If you could hop on a cruise ship, what places would you want to visit?
This post was created as part of my collaboration with Carnival. As always, all of the opinions, thoughts, and ideas in this post are my own.
