Mid-century Modern Wall Art with FabMo Materials

The area over my fireplace was pretty much barren ever since I took the holiday decorations down. A single large tassel I got a while back at FabMo and haphazardly hung on a random hook and looked rather forlorn.

Something had to happen and quick. That something, needless to say, could not involve a trip to TJ Maxx or IKEA to buy a piece of “art” that would also grace the walls of hundreds or thousands of other people’s homes and a trip to a gallery was not in the budget.

I have to admit to a complete lack of talent when it comes to drawing or painting – couldn’t do it to safe my life.

As a FabMo volunteer of many years, the new decoration also had to include FabMo materials.

So here is what I came up with:

I really like it, if I do say so myself, it goes well with my Eichler home and the existing color palette. What is more: it was amazingly easy to make. Here is how:

How to make wall art with paint chips

I found some large paint chips (8” x 8”) as well as smaller ones at Fabmo and took home a selection of colors that go with the colors in my home and looked good together.

I wanted to make a 3 x3 of panels so I choose nine different colors making sure I got several of each large piece plus some coordinating colors.

I laid out my nine favorite color squares leaving them 8” x 8” and then cut nine more from the same colors to a size of 7” x 7” using a guillotine (looks neater than cutting by hand).

Then I cut 6”, 5”, 4’, 3”, 2’ and 1” using the base colors but also adding in coordinating colors for visual interest.

I futzed around with the squares until I was happy with the design and then glued them together (I used the clear glue I bring from Germany but a good not to liquid glue or even a high-quality glue stick should do).

Initially, I thought that I’ll center all the squares into neat stacks but decided that that would drive me insane and – more importantly – it looked much more fun if the squares weren’t perfectly aligned.

The hardest part was finding the support. I needed at least 32” wide heavy-duty cardboard, ideally in a coordinating color. Michaels doesn’t have that size and having one shipped seemed wasteful. I lucked out, I had one in my stash, probably from some garage sale or maybe even from FabMo.

Another way would be to start with 7” or 6” squares instead on 8” and then use a smaller support that is easier to get. Framing shops might have larger ones (didn’t check) or maybe hanging each square individually on a smaller support (e.g. a framed canvas) might work and have the advantage that the whole piece would look a bit more 3D.

I attached the “square piles” onto the support making sure they are aligned.

Then I taped a string to the back put a generous dollop of glue to make it more stable and hung my piece.

I am not happy with the taped/glued string for hanging, it does not look stable enough and so if anybody has an idea of how to do it better, please let me know in the comments.

 Here is an idea for an alternative, if you have round hole punches in various sizes this might also look really cool with rounds instead of squares.

If you make one, please share.