Easy creative ways to display your kids’ art (and why you should!)
November 24, 2021
By Beth Herrild
Here at Outside the Box Creation, we believe in focusing on the process rather than just the pretty end product when you do art with your kids. If you want to read more about how to focus on the process rather than the product, checkout our blog post, Pretty Projects or a Better Process? That being said, when they create art that they’re proud of, it’s a great idea to display it! So let’s talk about easy, creative ways to display your kids’ art, and also, why you definitely should!
By creating a kid art gallery, you are celebrating your kids, saving memories, documenting their work, showing support, and encouraging their artistic endeavors! You can tell them that they’ve got their first gallery show. Maybe you invite friends and family over for a gallery walk! I recently listened to a podcast on which Dean Mitchell, a well-known contemporary artist, was being interviewed. He told a story about his grandmother taking him to the dime store to get inexpensive frames to display his artwork when he was a kid. They were pretty poor. The fact that his grandmother wanted to display his art made him feel like he could attain his dream of becoming a painter!
Different Approaches
There are several different ways to display your kids’ art that don’t involve magnets on a refrigerator. The first thing to think about is if you want the display to be permanent or static (unchanging), or if you want to be able to easily switch artwork out? Neither approach is wrong – just a matter of preference.
A Static Gallery
Custom framing from Framebridge
If you have a few pieces of art that you just love and want to display them permanently, then you can frame them. Framing can range from super expensive to relatively inexpensive.
The cheap route is to head to your local thrift store and find frames or even artwork in frames, that are the size you want. Then, it’s a matter of cleaning them up a little. We like the look of painting all of the frames black or white. That way, even if they’re different styles, it gives your art gallery a sense of cohesiveness. If you want to have a little more fun with it, you could paint all the frames different colors within a color palette. For instance you could use the primary colors: red, yellow, & blue; or you could pick two or three colors from the area of your home where they’ll be hanging.
The mid-range route is to order gallery frames, like these. They usually come with pre-cut mats and are pretty standard sizes. These are a good deal, but notice that they have Plexiglas instead of glass in them. This makes them safer around kids and also less expensive to ship. You should decide if you want Plexiglas or regular glass.
The most expensive way to create your gallery is to take your kids’ art pieces to a frame shop and have them custom framed. Michael’s Stores do this all over the country. Or you can send them off to a place like Framebridge. If you have kids’ artwork coming out of your ears, you can also photograph each piece and then create a large custom collage print with several of the online photo companies like Snapfish or Minted.
Rotating Gallery
If you want to be able to rotate artwork in your gallery, there are a couple of different ways to do that.
You can hang a wire or string across a wall. Picture wire, found in hardware stores, works great. Then get some little mini clothes pins or binder clips, like in the image at the top of this post. Amazon has a hanging rail set that you can purchase if you don’t want to find wire and do it yourself!
You can purchase frames that are made just for this purpose like Li’l Davinci Art Frames. These make it super easy to change your gallery. They open in the front so you don’t even have to remove them from the wall to change the picture inside! In fact, you don’t even have to remove the old artwork. You can simply add the newest one on top and use the frame to store up to fifty items!
If you want to go fun and funky, these frame decals come in a package and you have to cut them out. You stick them to your wall in an arrangement of your choosing. Then, you can simply tape kid’s artwork in the middle of the different frames. Another easy thing to do is to purchase a bunch of matching clipboards. Make sure they either have holes in the top of the clips or loops on the back for hanging, like these.
However you decide to approach it, you will enjoy being surrounded by your kids’ awesome, colorful artwork and they will feel empowered and supported! If you’re interested in learning more about how to talk with your child about their art, read our blog post, How to Talk to Your Child (or Anyone) About Her Art.
*Note: the Amazon links above are affiliate links. We receive a very small commission when you purchase through them, but your price does NOT change!
Besides the above mentioned, easy, creative ways to display your kids’ art, as a post script to this blog post, we just saw a really cool thing. This company creates stuffed animals from kids’ drawings! We aren’t affiliated with them in any way. We just thought what they’re doing is really a fun way to use your kids’ drawings!
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