It’s not shocker that wall art is expensive.  For many of us first-time homeowners, wall art is simply out of reach.  When we bought our home about two and half years ago, the only wall art we owned were regular picture frames and a few mirrors.  Since that time, we’ve slowly been finding creative ways to add wall art to our home without breaking the bank.  Up to this point, we’ve mostly found deals on wall hangings at discount stores like Marshalls and Home Goods, but we’ve also DIY’d a few pieces as well.

For a few months now, I’ve been staring at a stack of scrap wood in our garage and I’ve been determined to think of some clever use for all that good wood.  This wood is actually the product of some doug fir boards that we bought to assist with an outdoor project some time ago.  In fact, this wood sat outside in the elements for over a year before anything even happened to it.  About three months ago, Eric and I brought the boards inside and ripped them down with our table saw to renew them.

Initially, we were thinking we’d use them for another project, but that didn’t pan out.  So, there they sat…. Until now!!!  After seeing this wall art that Sherry at Young House Love created… I found renewed inspiration for these recycled wood scraps!

I decided to do a “washed-painted” effect on the wood and cut pieces on the diagonal, mixing and matching the colors.  Confused?  Ya, I would be too!  Here’s the basics of how it went…

Supplies needed:

• scrap wood
• paint samples in various shades
• paint brushes
• wood stain
• liquid nails and caulking gun
• piece of plywood to mount art to
• picture hanging hardware

1- Take scrap pieces of wood and paint with various watered-down paint samples.

2- Once dry, use chop saw to cut 45 degree angles into pieces of wood. Yes… I was actually using my chop saw while dressed in a cute, belted dress… I’m weird!

3- Arrange pieces of wood into a pattern of your choosing.

4- Using Liquid Nails and caulking gun, adhere all pieces to a piece of thin plywood.  I sparingly spread liquid nails all over the plywood, and then individually “back-buttered” all of the pieces to be applied to the plywood.

Once all of the pieces were applied, I decided that I wanted to “beef up” the art piece by adding a really thick border around the whole thing.  To do this, I again grabbed a scrap piece of wood and some wood stain that I already had on hand from our front door makeover.

5- Stain and cut wood to frame art.

6- Apply frame to art piece.  I used my Kreg Jig here, but liquid nails is a fine substitute since structural integrity is not necessarily important here.

7- Add picture hanging hardware of your choosing (to support the weight of your piece) and get it up on the wall!!!

I really love how the wood art plays off the rest of our home.  It totally draws the colors of our family room into the beige hallway and then caries your eye past to our placemat wall art that we did some time ago!

To get a bit of perspective, here, you can see where my office lies amongst the art in the hallway.  The placemat art is there on the left below, while the wood wall art sits on the adjacent wall to the right.

Oh ya… and in case you didn’t catch it, I used some of the drops from cutting the angles to make a monogram on the art piece!  I know it won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but it was a fun, playful addition that just made sense for us.  Also, it just added an extra depth to the piece that I really loved!

I had several goals with this project: recycled materials I already had on hand; create a rustic but polished piece; and tie in the colors of our home for a cohesive look.  I’m happy to say that I accomplished them!

WHAT DO YOU THINK?  LOVE IT/HATE IT?  HAVE YOU CREATED YOUR OWN WALL ART FOR YOUR HOME?

 

Linking up…

Young House Love
Centsational Girl
Bower Power
Ten June
My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia
Sugar Bee Crafts
A Bowl Full of Lemons