Helpful Hints for Displaying Family Photos on Your Walls

Displaying family photos is a fun way to showcase your personality and turn your house into a home. With careful planning and intentional placement, you can showcase your images in a way that looks designer-inspired without being tired or cliche. Here are some helpful hints for displaying family photos on your walls. 

Avoid Sunlight

Before you hang your family photos, note how the sun moves through the room throughout the day. Consider placing your photos in a shadowy corner or wall that doesn’t get direct sunlight through the windows.

Placing family photos in direct sunlight will cause them to fade and disintegrate over time. While this may not be a significant concern for newer prints that you can redo at any time, it should be a huge concern for heirloom photos from the pre-digital era. If you’re displaying old family photos, consider having your family photo film and negatives digitized and stored safely in the cloud. 

Use Cut Outs for Spacing

It can be difficult to conceptualize how your photos will look on the wall, even if you organize the frames on the floor beforehand. It’s best to get the spacing and layout right before you start putting nails in the drywall. 

Trace your frames on craft paper and cut out the silhouettes. Use some tape and paper versions of your photo frames to organize your display on the wall. This strategy allows you to take a step back and see how all of the images will look together. Then, you can quickly move some blocks around until you’re ready to make it real.

Create Balance

When hanging photos in a gallery format, try to create a sense of symmetry. This aesthetic consideration doesn’t mean hanging all of your photos evenly spaced or in a grid formation. Instead, consider how you’ll balance smaller and larger frames— perhaps offsetting one large photo with two smaller ones on the other side. 

Creating a sense of balance will help you find that fine line between creativity and chaos.

Add Other Decor Elements

Consider mixing other decor elements into your family photo display. There are endless options for making this feature more personal and sentimental. For example, you could punctuate photos of your grandparents with framed recipe cards from their kitchen. Pictures of your children could be set alongside imprints of their footprints from the hospital and some of their art from over the years.

The decor elements don’t have to be personal in nature. You can use color blocks, plants, or geometric sculptures to add dimension to the display. 

Consider Alternatives to Framing or Hanging

Instead of framing and hanging your photos, consider some of the other ways you can create an eye-catching display. One modern approach is to install floating shelves and lean the photos, layering smaller ones over the larger ones for a more casual look. You can also leave the prints unframed, using string and clips to hang them artfully along the wall.

Standing frames are another great alternative to consider. These floor structures are perfect for larger prints. You can get simple stands or room dividers with space for your favorite family pictures.

Create Consistency

Try to create a sense of consistency between your photos, especially if they feature different color schemes or time periods. You can accomplish this by matting them with similar colors or frames. 

Make it Versatile

Finally, consider making your family photo display versatile and easy to revise. This strategy allows you to keep things fresh and change out your photos for updated versions without having to rethink your display.

With these simple tips, you can create a stunning display of your family photos to make your home feel warm and personal.