The Frame Wall

 

I'd been at a loss about what to do with our ginormous brick fireplace for quite some time. 



It is really hard to land nails/screws in brick.  So how could I hang anything to cover this behemoth amount of bricks?



I found my design online.  A frame wall, with the above setup. 

 

I ordered the frames from Amazon, because it was the cheapest and easiest way I could find to get frames that all matched in all these various sizes (8x10, 10x20, 20x24).  

 

I first tried command strips to attach the frames to the brick.  Epic fail.  One of the frames fell in the middle of the night, shattering glass all over the living room floor.  Command strips were a no-go.

But you know what Daniel found?  Brick clips!  I had never heard of them before, but they are genius. They fasten on to the brick and then offer 2 hooks at different heights from which to choose.



So then I went about gathering the hanging hardware.  Since I had to get the spacing of the frames exact, I needed to be able to easily adjust the length of the picture wire on the back.  Daniel researched a little and found that a set screw collar would accomplish this nicely.



You just slip the wire through the set screw collar and the D ring (the little metal loop) and then slip the wire back through the set screw collar.



Then you tighten the screw inside the set screw collar.  I used a teeny little Allen wrench for this.  I got all my supplies from a local hardware store -- not one of the big box hardware stores. 



And voila!  Ready to hang the frames.



This was, as you might imagine, sort of a time-consuming process.  It involved a lot of climbing up on the step stool to adjust and then climbing back down to evaluate the spacing.



But, within a few hours, it was done.



And since I only had a few days before the baby shower I was hosting, I filled the frames with festive papers in the colors of the shower.  It looked awesome! 



Now I just need to find and print the real photos that will occupy these frames!