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  • Hi, I’m Emily

    Emily Fazio

    I'm a home improvement enthusiast, living a very merry DIY lifestyle.

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Old/New Watercolor

December 23, 2010

The original painting. Hung here on the side of the fridge. Once upon a time when the dining room was painted a vivid (and lovely) coral pink, I had a hard time finding (slash, affording) art that felt like a good fit in the downstairs living room/kitchen/dining room area. In addition to introducing coral pink textiles (blankets, pillows), I busted out my watercolor set to make a custom work of art that could help bring in more of the pink tones I was looking for. Now, I don’t consider myself an artist by any means, so what I ended up with had no rhyme or reason, and was pretty abstract, but it worked for me. For about a year, it sat on my mantle framed in that same metal frame that the fish are displayed in now (I wrote about that not too long ago right here).

But last summer, I made a change which eliminated the coral pink and replacing the color of the dining room walls with the more neutral olive-y green (technically Venetian Gold) shade that’s prominent in living room – the rooms suddenly flowed together wonderfully like I had wanted them to all along. I didn’t have a reason to get rid of the watercolor (I sort of like it), but wanted to display it somehow in a more muted way. A few months ago, I saw an interesting series of paintings framed in a hotel – it looked like the original art had been cut up and reframed into a series of smaller frames, so that’s just what I decided I’d try and do with this watercolor. I decided to use an assortment of frames that I already owned – they weren’t matching sizes or shapes, but I the frames I chose did have the painted-brass look in common.

There were about 30 different frames I considered – seriously, I have an obsession, all the frames came dirt cheap at garage sales – I sorted and arranged the frames (some still with other photos in them) until I came up with a configuration that make the most of the art, limiting waste.

Here's the final layout - I was able to cover most of the surface with frames, so I ended up with only a little bit of waste. Once I was confident with my decided frame layout, I used the glass in each frame as a template for outlining where I needed to do the trimming. Easy peasy. Cody helped… such a curious boy.

  • Glass used to measure the art to size.
  • Trimming the paper. Cody, sniffing curiously.
  • Art cut to size for the new frame. The waste is on the left of the photo - only had a little bit that couldn't fit into a frame!

I’m still not sure where I’m going to install the new framed art, and I’m not sure if I’ll keep it all together or separate it around the house, but for now I have it grouped on top of the bookshelf. I’m also considering adding a fine mat to each frame, or painting the frames again to be a little different. In any case, here’s what I ended up with – quick and easy project:

Framed, and displayed.

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Emily
I'm a home improvement enthusiast, living a very merry DIY lifestyle. I've been a freelancer writer for 10+ years and you can find my work on popular home and garden sites, like HGTV.com. Follow me on facebook and instagram, or drop me a note.

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  • HI, I’m Emily

    Emily Fazio

    I'm a home improvement enthusiast, living a very merry DIY lifestyle. Follow me on facebook and instagram, or drop me a note if you'd like. I love notes.

    Thanks for visiting!

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