7 alternative art display ideas to bring your walls to life

We all know that without art, a home feels unfinished. Add some art and your rooms will instantly come to life even if the room is unfinished in other ways.

Art doesn’t always have to be hung on the walls in a straight line and neither do you have to create a gallery wall.  There are lots of fun and creative ways to display your art and many of these are handy if you don’t want to make holes in your walls or if like me, you’re indecisive and like to move your art around often.

Here are some alternative ways to display your art that are a little different from your typical symmetrical or gallery wall displays:

1. Customise some budget picture ledges
This is such a cool idea… I wish it was mine. 🙂 These basic shelves from Ikea have been painted and used to display art.  The genius idea here is painting the shelves in the same colour as the walls so the shelves almost disappear and the art stands out.  Besides, it looks so effortlessly stylish too and makes it so easy to switch things up as often as you want.

2. Lean art on the floor
For me, this idea works especially well when your art is large.  Large doesn’t always mean huge, but rather large in proportion to the room. And there’s no need to stop at just one – you can lean a few in front of each other.  If your art isn’t quite big enough to lean on the floor, lean it on a cabinet or table or even piles of books/magazines. Or else, mix it up with some on the floor and some on the wall above.

3. Go frameless
You can create a beautiful wall of art without frames.  And no frames means no nails and no damage to the walls.  Instead use things like glue dots, poster tape/strips or even good old washi tape.

4. Frame in frame
This is an unusual idea that will create a great focal point in a room.  You can find large old frames like this in junk shops and flea markets and within minutes you can transform your walls.  You can mix it up with different displays like in the image above but I love the idea of just having one framed picture within a much larger frame.

5. Use a clothesline and pegs
This works best for small pieces of art like A4 and A5 sizes. It’s especially handy if you’re a collector of postcards or small prints and have a load of them.  Alternatively it’s great for displaying kids art too.  Once again, you can change up the art in seconds.

6. Hang it off centre
There seems to be this unwritten rule that art always has to be hung at the centre of a wall or the centre of a sofa or the centre of a table. Who made that rule? Hanging art off centre or in an unexpected place looks so much more dramatic and it effortlessly draws your eye to that space. Try it.

7. Use unwanted canvases
Got any unwanted canvases or can you get your hands on some?  It’s a really budget friendly way of displaying art especially if you have the odd unwanted canvas lying around.  Not only do you get a frame for your art, but you’re re-using something thats otherwise gathering dust and creating clutter in your home.

All of these art display ideas are a fun change from the more usual ways to hang art.  I’m already a fan of art on the floor – in my home we have more on the floor than the walls!  I’m now most keen to try the last idea – using the back of a canvas.  Love the simplicity of it.

What’s your favourite idea?

Image credits: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8