Pepper Design Blog

Large Abstract Art on a Budget

I’ve been on a pink kick. You’ve seen my diyed pink heart art, glimpses of the pink throw pillows for the living room (with a new coral glass vase for good measure) and my favorite addition – a big piece of pink dining room art. Pink is infiltrating the house.

In my dining room art post I mentioned just how tough it is to find oversized art on a budget. It’s really very tough! I continually find myself drawn to stunning pieces like this aboriginal painting over at Ish & Chi, an oil on canvas like this one by Jesse Mackay, and I hope that one day I can get my hands on an original Katherine Sable. One day I will choose art because it moves my heart and spirit and makes a room sing. But today price plays a big role.

As previously promised, today’s post is a round-up of favorite large pink art pieces that will rock a wall without totally killing the wallet (some of these are even originals):

1. Bethany Oliver Oberly, $189 2. Ora Birenbaum, $345 3. Sixth and Main Photography, $90 4. Annie Clark 5. Unknown landscape from Art.com, $24.99-199.99 6. Sarah Leslie, $34.99-69.99

Until that day comes when price is not a major factor in choosing wall art, there are plenty of creative ways to fill a large space on a budget:

*there are the do-it-yourself abstract options that involve a few tubes of paint and an oversized craft store canvas (purchased with a 40% off coupon, of course)
*the semi-DIY options (I turned this piece of fabric into a big piece of stretched canvas art, and had this botanical chart printed on fabric and then hung it with dowels. Other creative ideas include transforming a map into art or stretching an old flag over a frame – I actually have one ready to go and waiting for its stretch at the moment)
*the framed fabric or wallpaper look for a blast of pattern
*the thrift store, eBay or garage sale finds (I have a few of those hanging around)
*the small town artist (love art shows or even Etsy for these finds)
*or the print route (settling for a print is no big deal! There are plenty of creative ways to frame a print to even make it look like a canvas)

7. Tchmo, $17-57 8. Michelle Armas, $350 (my favorite) 9. So Very Happy, $45 10. Kelli Hall, $38-375 11. Unknown abstract landscape from Art.com, $24.99-199.99 12. Xilvar, $38-375

Some of these guys featured in the round-up are in the hundreds of dollars range, but many are in the double digits and with framing (see a great solution here if you don’t find a store bought frame that fits) might even come in below $100. Which is a total steal.

Happy art hunting!

PS A big thank you to SheKnows.com for featuring our dining room bookshelves in their favorite storage finds!

Kitchen Addition: Grandma’s Recipe Art

I thought I’d share a little project with you today that I recently hung up in our kitchen, but that I actually created about six months ago. We lost my Grandma just before our big trip to Europe and it was devestating. She was the local Grandma in my life that I was very close to – the one that taught me to bake, gave me sage advice on finding ‘the one’ (which subsequently confirmed my yes to Kevin) and who picked blackberries with me every summer when we visited Washington together. It was a very heartfelt loss and there were no words to describe it. To add salt to the wound it was in a matter of weeks that we were celebrating the passing of my other special Grandma, whom we had lost the year before.

But, I took what meant most to our relationship and created a piece of art that I thought my family would enjoy.

Grandma and I baked together at every opportunity we had – she was an incredible baker!

We couldn’t attend her funeral because of travel and that was a second blow to my heart. There was nothing to be done regardless of how hard I tried to change flights and so on… so instead of being there in person, I was there in spirit (while in the Ireland countryside, her heritage) and I wanted to leave something for the guests that were present to celebrate her life.

My first thought was to create a memorable piece of Recipe Art for everyone to take home and I was on the hunt to find an Etsy artist to help me out! But because of short notice (as these things often go, funerals that is) no one could fit my short timeline. Sooo, I opened Adobe Illustrator up and created the art myself.

I made about 50 copies for the funeral, packaged them up and sent them to my Dad to leave out for family. And now, finally, one of my prints hangs in our kitchen.

Lemon bars (hence the bright, happy color) is one of the BEST recipes we have from my Grandma, though I’m working on an entire cookie book inspired by Grandma’s delicious creations. She was a baker – a real conossieur of the trade. She taught me everything I know and it runs in my blood because of her. I hope to pass that on to my girls.

About a week prior to her death, I was visiting her home in my hometown of Santa Cruz and I sat down next to her bed with a tablet and began recording. I knew that I didn’t have much time and Grandma was happy to share her secrets (the ones that I had heard before, the ones that I was just learning for the first time) of baking with me. We went through hundreds of recipes together from her shelves and hand written books and boxes of torn out magazine clippings, and picked out about 30 that were her favorites. The legacy she will leave us is the love that she shared, the stories of her inspiring life, and her recipes.

Grandma’s memory lives in the heart of my home now, and she will be with me every time I bake.

 Love you, Grandma! I know you are watching over us with the angels now.

PS I shared the actual recipe here when we made lemon bars for Liv’s baptism. Delicious.

PPS If you are an Illustrator wiz, I’d be happy to share the original file with you so that you can edit it with your own favorite recipe. I can’t link it here because it’s not compatible, but feel free to email me at: morgan at pepperdesignblog.com

Dining Room Update: Giant {Pink!} Art for Spring

It’s been a while since we revisited the dining room, but I’ve been in the mood to inject some color into our home this spring (and pink, of all colors!) and this particular room was high on my list. We’ve had a wall in this space that for some time has needed one BIG piece of artwork. Something colorful and whimsical and oversized, a piece that would ‘pop’ with beautiful color.

But finding large artwork at a reasonable price is tough! I initially was on the hunt for a big piece of canvas art to add texture to the wall, but I soon realized that purchasing a piece that big (even if I saved my pennies for months) was not in the cards (though there are some really fabulous artists out there – I’ll try to get a post together on options). I patrolled Etsy and Art.com and every online shop in between. My mother-in-law gave me a huge 30×40″ canvas so that I could give creating my own abstract art a go – but then I found a piece that I fell for (that canvas will have to find another great spot in the house!).

Minted came on as a blog sponsor right about the time that I was giving up, and Minted’s print selection is over the moon fabulous! After searching through their beautiful selection, I fell in love with a print by Kelli Hall called Ligurian Houses. It was the perfect mixture of abstract, colorful, whimsical… it would fit the space perfectly.

Instead of framing the entire poster as it’s seen on Minted, I actually ordered the print in a much larger size than needed and then cut the poster down so that just the colorful artwork was visible. This is a great trick for any poster-style artwork, no need to frame the entire piece if there’s one particular portion that you love.

When the print (on a really thick, museum quality archival cotton rag paper) arrived, it was HUGE. I could have wallpapered the dining room wall with it.

When it came to framing, I was on the search for an economical solution, but one that would still look professional and great hanging there on that big ole wall. My favorite Ikea poster frames were just a few inches too long, and I considered breaking one apart as I did here but then decided that spending a little extra to have the right size made was probably worth the longevity of this image.

The most affordable route that I could find? Americanframes.com. I was especially happy that they offered to pop six frame samples into the mail before I ordered so that I could compare the different finishes and wood before making such a big purchase at about $85 sans the white matte.

I ended up settling on this natural frame because it matched well with the Ikea framed butterfly and dragonfly, and was the most inexpensive of the bunch.

 It felt like an eternity but finally my frame arrived! I spent last night assembling it. 

The wood frame came assembled and the backing, acrylic and hardware were in their own separate wrapping. A screwdriver (actually we pulled out the electric screwdriver for tightening the last few clips in place) and hammer later and the artwork was up!

I especially love how it plays so nicely with the new pink additions on the bookshelves in the living room.

I’m playing with adding a few lighter Spring-colored throw pillows into the mix as well. Yay for the arrival of Spring!!

Here’s a link to two additional semi-DIY over-sized pieces of artwork we’ve recently added to the house (and inexpensive solutions, too): ‘canvas’ fabric art for the living room and a black botanical chart for the kitchen.

PPS All dining room makeover posts can be found sorted right here.