Today I’ll be sharing the sources of our new dining room gallery wall and giving you sneak peeks of the minimal holiday décor popping up here at Mountainside Home.
Our dining wall was bare for close to 4 years. I’d lived with it for so long! One day I became so frustrated and felt the need to solve the problem immediately. This is how I decorate because by nature I truly am not a decorator. I’m a photographer. Capturing beauty comes easily for me, but creating it is another thing entirely. It takes a lot of time and visual research for me to decorate a space. I asked around and did a poll on Instagram and eventually found something I loved: the tri-style gallery set of a popular online framer. But unfortunately it wasn’t within our budget. My friend Karla of Raka Home recently told me about how she made a gallery wall using Ikea Ribba frames and custom mats from Mat Board and More. I thought we could mimic the look of these expensive frames using Karla’s technique and let me tell you- we loved the way they turned out! We chose the larger frame - the 24x36 3/4 and we bought three of the them. For the mats, we chose ones with lots of white space - we wanted to add visual interest on our wall, but not overpower the space with large photos. I debated about what images to place in the frames for weeks. Did I want abstract art, stock photos, family photos? In the end, I decided that I wanted the images to be meaningful. I found our film images from a 2017 trip to the Rocky Mountains. I knew I had made the right decision after my husband hung the finished product on the wall and both of my children looked up and literally gasped. Lesson learned. Print your photos folks!
We are still adding the finishing touches to our holiday décor around here, but I’ll share a few images of what we have so far along with our completed gallery wall. I hope you guys enjoy and feel inspired! Our sources and info on our custom mats will be listed after the gallery.
You can view Karla’s frame DIY on her Instagram stories here.
Click here for the link to our frames* (we used the 24 x 35 3/4)
The info on our custom mat from Mat Board and More:
Smooth White #BW222, Outer Size 24x36, Opening Size 13.5 x 10.5
Margins: Top: 5 1/4, Sides 5 1/4, Bottom 20 1/4 (Top Center)
Made to fit an 11x14 photo
Total Cost for the gallery wall : $178 (including photos)
Popular online framer cost: $450
*Please note that the frames are so affordable because the overlay is not real glass, but plexiglass. Which is fine with me because my kids have broken two glass frames already!
Dining Table: Custom made by my husband with hairpin legs from Etsy
Pendant: Similar
Rug: Similar
Flocked Christmas Tree: Similar
Wooden Tree: Similar