Paris Gallery Wall & Ikea Ribba Frame Hack

Hello there!

Do you like gallery walls? I sure do! I think they're a great way to bring a good punch of style to any empty wall or room. Today I have a beautiful Paris gallery wall to share with you, which has a little Ikea hack in the works, perfect for renters who can't drive nails or screws on those walls.

For the past couple of weeks, I've been working on bringing warmth and style to the room you see in the picture below. It belongs to one of my daughter's friends, her first room/apartment after venturing into the world on her own and she needed help bringing her vision to reality.

She wanted this decent-sized bright room to be turned into an elegant Paris retreat, and she wanted to have lots of pinks, black and gold accents. She also had a desk and dresser with a T.V. in front of the bed, but those pictures will be shared in an upcoming post for the reveal.

The gallery wall was the first project to be tackled here because it will be the focal point of this room and will certainly fill that empty space above the bed.

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I first thought of adding a peel and stick wallpaper to that entire wall, but the big size of the wall and the fact that maybe after installing the wallpaper I would need extra wall art, made me go another route.

I also considered a removable wallpaper mural like the one you see HERE. The problem with the mural was its size, not big enough to cover the entire wall and it would've needed a frame to look finished.

Both, the wallpaper and the mural, were nice alternatives, but I thought that a gallery wall with black frames and pretty Parisian pictures would be a fancier alternative, even though it was a more expensive solution.

I bought all the beautiful prints/posters at the Poster Store. The paper is thick and the quality is superb. I even got lots of inspiration from their website on how to decorate this room.

| Poster Store |

The Poster Store also sells the frames, but I went on a more economical route with the Ikea Ribba frames.

Here you can see me organizing the posters with their corresponding Ikea frames.

Each Ikea frame comes with the corresponding mat. Most of those mats didn't align with the pictures. But hey, I made them work, I remember using lots of crafter's tape to keep those pictures and mats in place.

| Ikea Ribba Frame | Rug | Coffee Table | Rug |

Once each poster got inside its corresponding frame, it was time to think about how to install them. 

As you can see, the Ribba frame's hardware is sunken (about 1-1/4") right there in the middle of the entire frame.

Now, let's remember, this is a renter's apartment, NO nails or screws should be driven onto that wall!

My solution: Adding 3/4" strips of wood to the side of the frames so I could attach a Command strip right there on each piece of wood and in that way hang the frames.  Well, a bit confusing here, but let me show you how you can do it! 

You can watch the following video or continue reading down below:

The Tools and Materials you'll need:

• Posters
• Ribba Frames
• Command Strips
• Wood glue
• Brad Nailer
• Laser level - Level
• 1 x 3 pine material cut in 3/4" strips

Directions:

1. CUT THE WOODEN PIECES

I don't have a picture for this step, but if you have a pile of wood scraps, you might have the material you need right there.

I used a 1 X 4 primed board, yep from the scrap pile. Which means its thickness is 3/4". Well, out of that board I cut as many 3/4" little pieces as I could. As a minimum, I needed 20 pieces of wood, since I had 10 frames to hang. However, I cut lots more, because I was planning on using four Command strips/wooden pieces on the big frames. 

2. ATTACH THE WOODEN PIECES TO THE FRAMES

Add glue to one side of the wooden piece, one that's not painted or primed. Better adhesion.

Wood glue and a couple of spring clamps are the main materials/tools to hold the wood in place while the glue dries.

But, I didn't want to wait for the glue to dry and that's why I used my brad nailer to shoot three 1" nails from inside of the frame.

| Ryobi Cordless Brad Nailer |

And for an over-kill, making sure those wooden pieces won't go anywhere, I also shoot two 3/4" smaller nails from the outside of the frame.

| Makita 23-Gauge Cordless Pin Nailer |

The smaller frames were installed with two Command strips. On the bigger frames, I used four.

Those extra pieces of wood might be a problem if you ever want to exchange the pictures you have in the frames, especially on the bigger frames.

3. SET THE COMMAND STRIPS & INSTALL

The final part is to attach the Command strips onto each wooden piece on the frame. I like that the prime side of the wood is the one holding the Command strips, here again, better adhesion for this purpose.

| Command Hanging Strips | Bosch Self-Leveling Laser |

Installing the frames was easy with the help of my Bosch self-leveling laser. The bed, was in this case, the center point for this gallery wall.

The only thing left to do was to peel off the Command strips, follow the level lines and push the frame hard against the wall, right there where the Command strips were attached. 

| Globe Lamp |

Here's a sneak peek at how this room is turning out!

❌⭕❌⭕

Check these other projects tackled in this room:

HOW TO PAINT A MIRROR FRAME GOLD

DUNCAN PHYFE CHAIR MAKEOVER

PARIS BEDROOM REVEAL

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