How to Decorate Your Home with Art

When decorating a room, divide the colors into percentages:
60% of a dominant color
30% of a secondary color
10% of an accent color

Translated to a room setting, it typically means:
60% of the room's color is the walls
30% of the room's color is the upholstery
10% of the room's color is the accents and accessories

Example 1 This room shows a clear example of this decorating rule. The result is a balanced, visually pleasing room with just the right amount of everything.


60% yellow
30% orange / wood
10% cream / white

Example 2 Here is another example of the 60-30-10 rule and this time you can see how the neutral wall color palys a dominant role in this theory.


60% khaki walls
30% white couch & trim
10% black accessories

Art works beautifully as an accent, or to bring the colors of the room together. Simply select colors in your 60-30-10 palette and look for art that has those colors in it. You're not looking for an exact match here. Picking up one or two of similar colors will send a cohesive message.

Now that you know how to proportion your colors, you're ready to select your 60-30-10 colors.

Analogous Color Scheme
This is the safest place to start. Analogous colors are next to each other on the color wheel, such as yellow and green, blue and violet, or red and orange. Rooms using an analogous color scheme typically are more casual, restful and muted in terms of coloration. This color scheme is best used in the more informal areas of the home. Family rooms, dens and bedrooms, places where you're searching for rest and recovery from the day look and "feel" great in analogous colors.

Complementary Color Scheme
Complementary colors are across from each other on the color wheel, such as red and green, blue and yellow, or purple and orange. Rooms decorated with a complementary color scheme tend to provide a clear separation of colors and often are more formal and more visually challenging. Complementary color schemes should be used in the more active or formal areas of the home. For example, the living room or dining room.

Don't forget the Black
This is an old adage in interior design. By adding a black element, say, a black box, lampshade, picture frame or other accent, you clarify and enhance all the other colors in the space. Try it - it really works!

How Does It Make You Feel?
When selecting a color, consider the mood of a room. In a bedroom do you want the feeling to be restful and soothing or dramatic and intimate? Soft, cool colors and neutrals usually create a quieter feeling while stronger colors are for drama. Do you want a dining area to feel sociable and stimulating or appear formal and quiet? Warmer, contrasting and somewhat brighter colors add to a sociable atmosphere; deeper blue-greens and neutrals will give a more formal ambiance.

There is a magic number for how high to hang art: 57" on center. "On center" means that the middle of the picture is at 57". Interestingly, the 57" - 60" standard represents the average human eye-height and is regularly used as a standard in many galleries and museums.

If you stick to this standard, you create a harmony among all the pictures in your home, as they will always hang in relationship to one another from their centers, not their sides. Additionally, this helps solve the problem many people have, which is that they hang their pictures too high.

Use the right hooks. Contrary to popular belief, you needn't hammer nails into studs, nor install hefty drywall anchors to support art.
Use picture-hanging hooks, rather than heavy nails or screws. Although they may seem dainty, they are very secure. It's all based on shear weight. The picture hooks go into the wall on an angle, like a cat's claw. Make sure to buy the right type of hook for your artwork's weight.

The size of art should relate to the wall size. Choose smaller pictures for narrow walls and larger works for big wall spaces.

When hanging art over furniture, it should be placed so it relates to the furniture. A good rule of thumb is it should not be longer than the width of the furniture (about 75% of the width), and to hang it low (4 to 8" above the top of the sofa, table, dresser, bench etc).

The use of line is sometimes overlooked by home decorators, yet proper use of line can set the mood in a room.

Horizontal lines tend to elongate, widen, and emphasize a casual decorating scheme. Vertical lines however, tend to be more formal, add to the illusion of height, and can seem more elegant and refined.

Strong horizontal lines in artwork, or in the way artwork is framed or hung, tend to be calming and can give the illusion of width in a narrow room. Strong vertical lines -- in a picture, in a frame, or in the arrangement on the wall -- add to the feeling of height in a room. The arrangement shown here is made even more dramatic by hanging the prints one above the other, furthering the sense of height.

Windowless or Small Areas. Landscape art is one good way to visually open up a smaller space. The view of a distant horizon acts as a sort of "window" giving the impression of a faraway vista. The windowless corner of a room feels more open with an expansive landscape, and adds the look of a "window".

Doors and windows can look magical with framed art hung on either side. The door or window will provide another framed vista.
Curves

Unusual spaces make surprisingly imaginative places for hanging framed art. A set of pictures hung above a door fills the usually dead space between door and ceiling and makes the room appear taller. Pictures can be hung on cupboards and wardrobes, propped on shelves, rested against books and even hung on the ceiling.

But Not Every Wall Needs Something. A series of single pieces hung on every wall in a home can feel cluttered and haphazard. Leave some walls unadorned to create "negative space" that allows the remaining pieces to take center stage.

The most important thing to remember about hanging framed art is that it is the picture that is important. The role of frame and mat is to complement and flatter the image, not to compete with it.

Be generous with the proportions of any mat. To create a pleasing effect, a mat is seldom designed with strictly equal borders around all sides. The proportions are often subtly adjusted so that the width at the bottom of the image is greater than that at the top and sides. This compensates for the optical illusion that makes the space at the bottom of a picture appear smaller than the space at the top.

Consider the profile of the frame. When framing landscapes, the best choice for a frame is one with a concave profile which leads the eye into the picture. However, if the scene has less depth, for example a portrait or still life, the best shape of frame would be a convex one. Because it falls away from the image at the outer edge, a convex frame presents the picture toward you and offers the illusion of depth to a two-dimensional painting.

Consider if an image is an introvert or extrovert. An intimate picture, perhaps a delicate painted or photographed portrait or a domestic interior requires a gentle frame. A challenging, strident image should be framed boldly.

Finally, framing does not have to be expensive. Typically, buying frames together with the art online can be extremely expensive. For a cheaper option, buy the art first, then buy the frame separately from places like AmericanFrame.com or PictureFrames.com. You could also get your art framed at your local framing shop.

There is a new and easier way to discover art for your home. Visit Little Art Engine for the first and only wall art recommender with a virtual fitting room. It brings you the best art from art.com and allposters.com.

With a wall art recommender, you can complete your home decor in less time and with less effort. You don't even need to be a designer or an art historian - just sit back, select pictures you like and get art recommendations streamed right to you. Gone are the days of browsing painfully through thousands of items the old-fashioned way.

Don't buy something without first seeing how it will look in your home. Upload a picture of your own room and preview art using the Virtual Fitting Room. Have fun trying different art styles and colors with your decor, without the guesswork.

Don't decorate alone - save art ideas and share them with friends. It's often helpful to get a second opinion, much like bringing a friend with you to help you shop for clothes.

Congratulations, you now have the secrets to transform your naked walls into beautiful walls. Now hurry, go on over and get your FREE wall art suggestions at the Little Art Engine, before your housewarming or your next celebration!

"Filling a space in a beautiful way, that's what art means to me" - Georgia O' Keefe
"As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life" - John Lubbock
"Art washes away from the soul, the dust of everyday life" - Pablo Picasso
"Art is the only way of running away without leaving home" - Twyla Tharpe