How To Hang A Gallery Wall
Most gallery walls go wrong for one of two reasons. They are hung too high, or they are too small for the wall. Everything else is taste.
Here is what actually matters, in the order it matters. It takes about twenty minutes and one pencil.
1. The 145 cm line
Hang it so the centre of the whole arrangement sits 145 cm from the floor. That is roughly eye level for an average adult, and it is the height galleries and museums use. It will feel low while you are holding it up against the wall. Do it anyway — it will look right the moment you step back.
The most common mistake in the country is hanging art at the height it feels natural to reach, which is about 30 cm too high. If your prints look like they are floating away from the sofa, that is why.
Over furniture, the same rule holds, with one addition: leave 15 to 25 cm between the top of the furniture and the bottom of the frame. Any more and the two stop reading as one thing.
2. Two-thirds of whatever is underneath
The arrangement should span roughly two-thirds the width of the furniture below it. A three-seater sofa is around 210 cm, so you want about 130–140 cm of art. A sideboard at 160 cm wants about 105 cm.
This is the rule people break most expensively. One A3 print over a three-seater sofa looks like a stamp on an envelope. It is not that the print is wrong — it is that one print is not enough.
3. Five centimetres between frames
Keep the gaps even and tight — about 5 cm. Tighter than that and it reads as one busy block; wider and the wall stops being an arrangement and starts being some pictures that happen to be near each other.
Whatever gap you pick, use the same one everywhere. The eye forgives an odd layout. It does not forgive inconsistent spacing.
Four arrangements that work
You do not need to invent anything. These four cover almost every wall in a normal house.
Two A3 anchors with four A5 around them
About 105 × 93 cm. The easiest one to get right, because the two big prints do the work and the small ones just fill in. Good over a two-seater, a sideboard or a double bed.
One A3, four A4, four A5, staggered
About 126 × 108 cm. More prints, more variety, and it fills a proper living-room wall. The single A3 gives the eye somewhere to land — without it, nine prints of similar size turn into wallpaper.
A grid of six A4
About 92 × 78 cm. Even, calm and symmetrical. Best when the prints share a strong visual language — a set from one series, or all black and white. If the prints are wildly different, a grid makes the clash louder rather than quieter.
A vertical run
About 38 × 162 cm. For a stairwell, a chimney alcove or the narrow strip beside a door. Follow the line of the stairs rather than the floor, and keep the 5 cm gaps.
Do it on the floor first
Lay the whole arrangement out on the floor before a single hole goes in the wall. Move things around until it looks right, then photograph it on your phone so you have a reference while you are up a ladder.
Then the trick that saves the plaster: cut paper templates. Draw round each frame on newspaper or wrapping paper, cut them out, and stick them to the wall with masking tape. You get to see the real thing at real size, and you can move a piece of paper as many times as you like. Mark the hook position on each template, then hammer through the paper.
What you need
- A pencil and a tape measure
- Masking tape and old paper for templates
- A spirit level, or the one on your phone
- Picture hooks for plaster, or adhesive strips if you are renting — check the weight rating, a framed A3 with glass is heavier than it looks
Or skip all of it
Every one of the arrangements above is available as a Feature Wall — a fixed set of prints, already chosen to hang together, at one price. The sizes are decided, the layout is worked out, and there is a diagram in the box. Six prints from £58, nine from £89.
- Wild Things — animals, from four different series
- After Dark — cities, moons and a fairground carousel
- Quiet Hours — sage, sand and terracotta, nothing shouting
- Full Volume — loud on purpose
Or build your own from the full range. Everything is printed to order on 240gsm textured art paper in South Yorkshire, so a set arrives together and matches.
The other guides
- How to hang a gallery wall — heights, spacing and four layouts that work
- A5, A4 or A3? — what each size is actually for, room by room
- Framing a print — mounts, the centimetre trap, and what to buy