Botany Printable Art and a Wall Decor Hanging Trick
A free download of botany printable art perfect for spring and summer, plus a wall decor hanging hack to make hanging frames quick and easy.
If you didn’t notice, radio silence hit hard here on the blog last week. Since we’ve had so much happening lately, it’s been challenging to keep up with everything that entails putting together a blog post to update you guys. There are days I have to throw in the towel and tell myself I can’t do it all.
In the past month, Robert and I have bought a house, traveled to Austin, Miami, and Chicago for several work-related events, and painted 5 rooms top-to-bottom. All I can say is thank God for grandparents who double as babysitters. Life in the fast-lane isn’t really our speed- total homebodies over here. We missed our little love bug so much in the midst of all the work we’ve been doing lately that we decided we needed to spend some good ol’ quality time with her for a little while.
As soon as we unpacked our suitcases from our very last trip last week, we were finally able to vacate my parents’ home and officially move into the new house to spend our first night here as a family just in time for my 30th birthday. It’s been absolutely glorious to have a home that’s really ours again.
The first thing I did upon moving in… made a gallery wall. Makes total sense, right? (Don’t most people unpack? I dunno.) Decorating just makes my heart happy.
This one is not nearly as complex as the gallery wall in our last house. Even better, the botany art I printed for it cost $3 per print. Boom!
I’ve always had a love affair for botanicals (even to go as far as rip it out of thrifted books); there’s an elegance to it, and it never fails to add warmth and to soften up a stark, rigid space like our living room has been lately. I tried to fight against it to try something “new”, but then I decided, if you really love something, don’t hold back. And I lurv me some botanicals so…
I ended up having to hang these 6 frames by myself while Robert was at work and Olivia was at preschool using this handy dandy trick that I’ve used for several years now. No measuring, no oopsie nail holes, no second pair of eyes needed. The secret: toothpaste.
It’s totally weird, right? I can’t believe I’ve never shared it before.
Supplies Used: (Some affiliate links are provided below for convenience.)
- 6 – 18″x24″ color engineer prints (I had mine printed at Staples.)
- 6 botany art files (You can download mine by clicking on the button to subscribe near the end of this post.)
- 6- 16″x20″ frames (I used these.)
- A tube of toothpaste*
- Hanging nails and hammer*
- Small level
(*Scotch Mounting Tape works well too, if you don’t want to nail into your wall.)
To print the color engineer prints, go here on Staples.com, click the “design now” button in the lower right corner, and click “engineering prints in color”. In the pop-up window, click “add files” to upload the botany art files. The images are already sized to 15″x20″. Click “upload”, select the 18″x24″ size on the “media” tab on the left, and click “portrait” orientation. Do not click “size to fit” unless you want the print to be larger than 15″x20″.
*Some of y’all have reported your local Staples not printing these as engineer prints (it varies by location). If you need a great alternative, you can try overnightprints.com
I was able to find these frames for $11 each on Michaels.com by combining a really good sale with a 20% off coupon. They look so much like wood and glass in person, but they’re just plastic poster frames. I’ve debated dry-brushing or gray-washing the wood-look frames to break up all of the brown tones a bit, but Robert thinks we should leave them. What do you think?
My prints were an inch shorter on the sides than the actual frame because of the dimensions of the original image, so I just took the white paper out of the frame, centered my print on the “glass”, pressed in place with the cardboard type backing, and closed the metal tabs. It just ended up looking like an aged border, so it worked out perfectly! Problem solved.
Everywhere I looked online to buy botanical frame sets of 6, they were all over $200. My set is $84. Ha! Frames ain’t cheap, yo!
To hang them up, I just dab a little smaller than a pea-sized amount of toothpaste on the nail hole on the back of the frame, place the frame on the wall where I want it to hang, and press.
It leaves that little bit of toothpaste on that spot on the wall so that I can drive a nail or a screw into it. Hang it up, and voila! Perfectly in place.
I originally found the prints online as public domain images. There are thousands upon thousands of high resolution free-for-public-use pictures out there, so if you ever want free wall decor, all it takes is a quick search.
If you don’t want such large prints, you can still print them on your home printer at a smaller size to frame in an 8″x10″ or a matted 10″x13″.
So now we have this feminine touch of leaves and flowers above this masculine looking wagon bench, which I found a couple of years ago on Craigslist for $35. I loved it so much in the hallway of our last house that I couldn’t bare to part with it.
This spot is right beside our back door, so it will be great for putting on shoes before trudging through the backyard or dumping our bags after a long day. (Or a certain 4 year-old can pretend she’s driving a horse-drawn carriage… that kind of stuff.)
I’m sure I’ll change out the prints later this year once fall and winter arrive, but these are perfect for spring and summer.
Here are some of the rest of the sources I used in this little spot too:
- Baskets (I found mine for $7 each at Tuesday Morning. Score!)
- Striped throw blanket (Mine was $25 from T.J.Maxx)
- Artificial ZZ plant (also from T.J.Maxx for $50)
- Oblong cream pillow
- Square cream medallion pillow
- Bench ($35 on Craigslist but haven’t had any luck finding it anywhere else)
- Metallic Haurache sandals (just because they’re the comfiest/best summer shoes I’ve ever owned)
- Paint colors: (Walls- Benjamin Moore Swiss Coffee, Trim- BM Simply White, Doors- BM Wrought Iron)
You can download these botany art prints from my subscriber printable library by clicking here or on the button below to sign up.
*If you’re already a subscriber, the downloadable prints are already in your email.
Between this and our breakfast nook banister wall planter, that makes 2 walls decorated out of about 100… so it seems. Got any ideas for the other 98? 😉
If you want to save this post for later, you can pin it here:
So as a “test run” I tried downloading a 760px file and uploading that for my print. Is this enough resolution? What did you do? Ordering original prints or “Art Scans” are not free, so the download option seems to be the only one.
Hi Terry, My images are scanned at high resolution so when you download them and then upload them to Staples site for printing, they will turn out great.
760 is probably not high enough resolution. I originally found these prints online as public domain images. There are thousands upon thousands of high-resolution free-for-public-use pictures out there, so if you ever want free wall decor, all it takes is a quick search.
Thank you for this…I’m more excited about being able to source prints than about the toothpaste (although that is pretty cool too)! I also love botanical prints but I’m picky about the species as I’m a native plant purist. I have a few plant prints by a local artist that I purchased years ago for $20 each, and I knew that collecting more would be a real investment. But if this works out I could have enough to change out the species as they grow and bloom over a season. And as my husband is a woodworker and has made custom frames for me (which are hanging over our bed around some limited-edition bird prints) I know he’ll be glad to do it again (once he finishes building out our new house ;))! I may subscribe just for this…I’m too left-brained to have ever thought of doing this myself.
I’m so bummed! I followed your instructions step by step, did NOT size to fit and yet they blew them up to 18x 24 anyways! So now they are too big for the frame and they are slightly pixelated. I wonder if I can return these and try again!
Oh no! Yes, definitely return and explain that they were not supposed to be size to fit. They printed them incorrectly.
I called the store and explained. They apologized for sizing to fit and reprinted them for me! I purchased the frames and immediately came home and put it all together. It looks amazing! Thank you so much for this tutorial. I have been wanting a set of botanical prints for my living room for quite a while now and couldn’t stomach the hefty price tag. You made it possible! Lol Thank you!!
I had the same issue. They are way too big for the space. I think I’ll try to take them in and see what they say. I also had an issue with them turning out too yellow. Do you know if there’s a way to adjust the coloring on them a bit? Staples would print them for me on cardstock for $9 a print. Not as good as $3 a print but better than $15!
Shannon, I hate that this happened? How big did they turn out? They are originally sized for 16×20 but will have a white border meant to be trimmed off. As for the yellow tone of the picture; these are copied from an antique book. The pages are no longer white. I am pretty sure they were never true white when printed. You could possibly adjust the color. However, I have never tried as I prefer the antique look they have. Let me know how it turns out. I look forward to hearing if the change appealed to your decor preference.
I had the same issue, except when they called me they said would need to be done on the $20 paper. I said no thanks and cancelled order!
I just tried to do this at my local staples and unfortunately they said they don’t do this anymore ?. Something about how much ink it requires on their paper. They said they have to be printed as posters at $15 a print. I’m so bummed because I love the idea!!
And I just saw all the previous comments so I guess I’m not the only one. I’ll try having them mailed to me and see if that works! ?