My friend Brook and I met in sixth grade. She means so much to me..I could just go on and on about her..needless to say,  I was thrilled when she sent me this photo of her awesome collage wall.  I am going to let her tell you about the process in her own words..it’s long which I love, like having a chat with her..I think it will really give you an idea of how to do a daunting project like this..enjoy!

SO WHERE DID YOU FIND THIS GREAT COLLECTION?

Well, everything came from either a thrift store or were items I inherited from my Grandmother that I updated a bit…I look for shapes that catch my eye but will need a little work- a brass trivet shaped like a key, an octagonal piece of wood with a funky decoupaged mushroom, an empty round picture frame painted bright pink, two 80′s style curtain rod holders in a wavy shape made out of oak.  Then I look for vintage looking pictures & postcards- it helps if they are in funky, vintage frames but if not, I know I can always paint them.  Then I looked for just plain picture frames and framed mirrors that were cheap (we’re talking .25 cents or less for the frames and $1.00 or less for mirrors).  Nothing was uniform and nothing matched but it all appealed to me because of shape, size, texture or color (for pictures).

HOW DID YOU DECIDE WHAT WOULD GO WHERE?

I laid everything out on my craft room floor and looked at everything for color.  I picked out about 3/4 of the items and spray painted them black- mirrors, picture frames, the trivet, and the wall sconce things.  I left a couple things in their original frame and I pulled a frame I had painted green for another project out of the closet and arranged again.  Then I ripped one of the needle points out of its gold frame and layered the frame on others to add dimension.  I needed more color so I took some scrap fabric and wrapped & hot glued it to an empty frame.  The plate looked empty so I dug into a jewelry box from my teenage years and dug out a clip my dad brought back from Russia YEARS ago and glued it to the plate.  I arranged again.  After I painted the trivet, you couldn’t see it on the black frame so my sister glued bright blue paper (picking up one of the more muted colors in the artwork) to the back of the frame.  I had a few M’s from craft stores laying around the craft room so my sister decoupaged one of them.  I glued the decoupaged M to the piece of wood.  The starfish was also in the craft room from another project (and it has special meaning for our family) so I glued it to a picture frame again, to add texture and dimension because I didn’t want the wall to look flat.

HOW DID YOU ACTUALLY GET IT UP ON THE WALL?

I don’t feel like I have an eye for this sort of thing but I’ve looked at enough blogs and spent enough time reading about what other people are doing to know the basics of what I wanted- hang things close together, the overall shape doesn’t have to be square, don’t paint everything black, use fabric, pick up colors I’ve used other places in the room/house, use what I have, use what I love, use our initial.  Basically, I took things I love for various reasons put them in the floor and arranged and arranged and painted and tweaked and added and took away until I LOVED it.  The gathering took about a year, the tweaking and putting together took about a morning.    But that’s how I decorate.

{Note: Brook’s sister Amanda (who is a now a beautiful, grown woman but I will always think of as a precious little girl) helped her finally take the plunge and hang her collection on the wall…SO Brook highly suggests enlisting a friend to help with the installtion part of this project!}

Thanks Brookie!  Well done! I love the variation of color and shape and the use of fabric and a trivet..so clever!