How to Create a Budget Gallery Wall (Without Nail Holes)

Step 1:  Pick the Location of the Gallery Wall

In my house, the correct location for a gallery wall was painfully obvious.  We actually purchased this house because, unlike many houses in North Texas, it had a living room that could accommodate our upright piano.  Fast forward 17 years, both sons had declined piano lessons, and the piano has been played 5 times and tuned once. It looked like an especially short, lonely, and unloved wallflower.  Every day, the negative space screamed: “Do something with me!”  

Apparently, I have a very high tolerance for screaming negative space.  🙂

Therefore, Step 1 in the gallery wall project is to (1) pick the location of your gallery wall and measure the space that you will allocate to your frames, (2) identify the size(s) and number of frames that you will need, and (3) identify whether those frames will run vertically, horizontally, or a mix.

Step 2:  Find Your Frames

Step 2 in the gallery wall project is to find a budget-friendly frame that works for you.   When I found these frames at IKEA, it became clear that I could create a gallery wall that didn’t cost hundreds of dollars.

I knew that my gallery wall would be too busy if I included color prints, so the silver finish worked for my black and white prints.  Because I had to fill a giant wall, I wanted to hang the frames vertically, but your wall and room might call for a different approach.  Note, however, that you should hold off on buying your frames until you have taken Step 3 and found your artwork.

Step 3:  Find Your Artwork

I remember our dear friend Jack’s words very clearly.  We were darting over hills and down dales in Switzerland, and Jack noticed that both Howie and I were taking pictures about every 60 feet.  He asked, “What are you going to do with all of the pictures?”  Perfectly valid question.  

His words hit home because there is no point in wasting time taking 1000 pretty mountain pictures if we were not going to organize them, display them, and share them.  Before that trip, I had thought of vacation pictures as something that you put in photo albums or shared in emails/texts.  I didn’t really consider my pictures to be wall-worthy art — especially not a fancy, piano-hugging giant wall that was the first thing you saw when you opened the front door.  I was wrong.  Photographs can absolutely be wall-worthy art if you take the time to crop and edit them.  

Therefore, Step 3 in the gallery wall project is to think of a theme for your gallery wall.  I chose to drive around our town and take pictures of places that brought back some fond memories:  old town buildings, ballpark, church, chapel, country club, cows, and bell tower. You could decide to do a wall of landscape pictures, florals, family portraits, former homes, or favorite trips.  Once you have a theme, select photos that have the correct horizontal or vertical orientation that you need for your gallery wall.

Step 4:  Edit Your Photos

Step 4 in the gallery wall project is to edit your photos.  There are a number of online applications as well as computer software that will let you crop and edit your photos.  A tutorial on how to edit your photos is outside the scope of this article, but you should consider whether you will edit the photos so that they’ll look consistent/harmonious on the wall—or not—depending on your aesthetic.

If you want more control of the mat size without increasing your costs, you can also edit your photos on your computer to create a white, black, or colored border by using the amazing and free GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP).

For example, to create the white border around my images, I opened GIMP and did the following:

1. 1. File, New (Create a New Image)
   2. Select Image Size (consult a Pixel Chart for your frame size), I selected 4800 width x 6000 height for my 16 x 20” frame, OK
   3. File, Open as Layers, Select Your Photo on Your Computer
   4. Layer, Scale Layer, 2400 width x 3600 height, Scale
   5. File, Export As, Rename the File, Export  

You will export a versatile png file that you can, if necessary, convert to a jpg file by opening the image in Pixlr and then saving as a jpg.

Step 5:  Print Your Photos

Step 5 in the gallery wall project is to print your photos.  There are tons of photo printing options available.  Depending on the size of the print, I have had luck printing online with Target, Walgreens, and CVS and picking up the prints in a local store.  For this particular project, however, the size of my frame (16 x 20”) dictated another approach:  Shortrunposters.com.

I uploaded my files and selected the following options:

1. 1. Poster Branding:  Branded (our logo on reverse side)
   2. Poster Finish:  Matte / Dull
   3. Margin:  No Margin / Full Bleed

A week or so later, the prints were at my door in a sturdy tube.  The quality of the prints was stellar, and the price point was so reasonable that I plan on using the service again when I’m ready to change the prints out for something different.

I carefully pulled the prints out of the tube and laid them on the table to de-curl while I collected my other supplies, including the frames, painter’s tape, measuring tape, level, 3M Command picture hanging strips (weigh a frame before picking these out), felt pads to protect the walls, some yarn long enough to span the width of the project, and a ladder.

Step 6:  Play With The Arrangement and Numbers

While you’re collecting your other supplies, print out a scaled-down 8.5 x 11” version of the prints, tape or pin them up on a wall where you usually sit (it does not have to be the actual wall that you’ll be using for the gallery), and periodically look at them.  Does the arrangement please you or do you need to rearrange it?  You can also do this part of the project digitally on the computer, but it was much easier for me to walk into my office, see the actual prints on the wall every day. and notice problems with my arrangements.  

Once you’re happy with the configuration, you need to figure out:

1. 1. the number of inches between the floor or furniture that you will be hanging the first row;
   2. the number of inches between the top row of pictures and the ceiling;
   3. the number of inches on either side of your gallery; and
   4. the number of inches between each picture.

For my project, I chose to start the first row of pictures 6½ inches above the top of the piano and left a 2-inch gap in between each of the frames.

Step 7:  Hang Your Gallery Wall (Without Nail Holes)

Step 7 in the gallery wall project is to put your prints in the frames, affix Command strips/felt pads to the frames, and hang them up.  My chief concern was that we’d get halfway through hanging them up and realize that they were skewed slightly to the right or left (which is really only a good look in Italy).

For our project, I carefully measured out three 6½ inch strips of painter’s tape and stuck them to the wall over the piano.  I used a piece of yarn and ran it horizontally over the tops of the 6½ inch strips and stood back to eyeball it in addition to using a level. As long as your first row is level, the rest of the rows should be level, too.

Watch the video above for a short slideshow of what our gallery wall looked like as it was going up.

As the pictures show, I used painter’s tape to determine where the first row of pictures should go.  I used two medium picture hanging 3M Command strips on the top two corners of each frame and followed the package instructions, which included placing the strips on the wall and waiting an hour for the adhesive to build before hanging the first row.  Once the first row was up, I cut 2-inch strips of painter’s tape to determine exactly where the rest of the frames should go.  

Cost-Benefit Analysis

Our total cost for 9 frames, 9 prints, 3M Command strips, and felt pads (including postage and tax) was just under $160 or $17.78 per picture.  Using your own photos to make a gallery wall makes the results highly personal as well as budget-friendly.  Not only can you switch out the pictures in the frames at any time, but 3M Command strips make it easy to remove the entire gallery without damaging the walls with unsightly nail holes.

The best part for us? 

No more screaming negative space and hundreds of dollars more in our bank account for travel and retirement.