We all know that decorating your home with art is an intensely personal activity; whilst choosing artwork to match your style, your budget AND your home can be a tricky business!

So, rather than attempting to advise you on what artwork to buy, I talked to the advisors at ArtsHaus, an online platform for affordable, original art, to get their top tips on some foolproof ways to decorate your home with art, to create harmonious and stylish interiors!

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Our Three Simple Rules For Wall Art

When it comes to choosing the placement of artwork around your home, we try to consider three universal concepts which apply to any artwork and interior pairing! Keep these simple things in mind and you can soon find the perfect home for your new piece.

Colour When it comes to colour there’s two routes you can go down. Either look to use artwork to create a complimentary splash of colour which is in keeping with your existing furnishings, or to make it THE splash of colour in a more paired back room. In rooms where there is already a good measure of colour, it proves wise to choose artwork with complimentary colours – perhaps picking out two or three accents from the furnishings and look to replicate this in the artwork. E.g. if you have blue cushions, look for blues in the artwork (or change your cushions to create that effect!) In a more simplistic room with white walls or cream furnishings, you have ultimate freedom! But consider whether you want a colour that’s more ‘bright and energetic’ or ‘subtle and calming’ – this might depend on the room e.g. the living room versus the bedroom.

Texture Different mediums have different textures. Paintings for example can have a lot of texture to them, whilst photography, typically has a flatter and sleeker look.



You’ll often find that artwork without texture feels at home in equally clean and minimal surroundings. You might find that colourful photography is a great addition to modern scandi-style flats for example.

In contrast, artwork with texture and grain, such as an oil painting, creates a certain richness and warmth which is well suited to interiors designed for comfort and cosiness. You can imagine a landscape painting being a natural fit for a country home full of woods and heavy pile carpets for example.

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Composition Just as you would look for complimentary shapes, lines and angles throughout your furnishings, the same applies to artwork. It’s all about making sure that nothing jars.



If your furniture features soft curves and fluid lines, choose artwork that incorporates sweeping strokes or flowing movements. Furniture with more hard, angled or industrial edges can match artwork with more defined lines and crisper detail.

If there’s lots going on in the surrounding environment it can be beneficial to choose artwork which is more simplistic to create a moment of calm in a busy room. Whilst rooms which are extremely neat and tidy provide an excellent stage for an artwork which has more to say.

How to pull off some typical hang-styles:

The Gallery Wall:

When galleries are well is done well, they can have amazing impacts. It’s great if you have lots of small pieces which are looking for a home and look a little lost on their own!

Although some might consider it a bit of a free for all, there is a bit of an art to it! The best gallery walls have an underlying consistency or theme – look for some recurring colours, tones or subjects in the artwork e.g. create a mixture of portraits and figurative work or use only vintage-style frames.

Lacking enough artwork to fill your salon? Why not hang at present, you can even team the artwork with mirrors or empty wooden/metal frames for a quirky bohemian look temporarily until you find the perfect addition to replace it with.

Before you create lots of holes in your wall, make sure you decide on the arrangement beforehand by laying out all your pieces on the floor and shuffling around till you find the perfect fit!

The Gallery Grid:

A great alterative to the gallery wall – the gallery grid is an arrangement that suits those of us who like a bit of order in our lives.

Consistent sizes, frames and style give this display the look of a large piece of artwork, often at a fraction of the price!

This type of hang works really well when all of the artwork correlates. This is best achieved by buying from the same artist as they will usually have a collection of similar artworks – limited edition prints are often the most cost-effective way of doing this!

Alternatively, if you can’t commit to just one artist, photographic artwork can usually be printed to standard sizes, to create a wonderful grid of landscape or black and white photographs from a variety of your favourite artists. (Just use the same frames.)

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Supersized Statement Pieces:

One of my favourite things about large format artworks is that they make a statement. If the artwork itself is simple or subtle, it reflects the confidence in the artist and the buyer.

We often find that artwork which has a strong, single or two-tone nature works best. Keep the rest of the surroundings plain and simple and use your artwork to create that punch of colour which illuminates the entire room.

And don’t be tempted to fill empty wall space in their shadows with smaller works. That will simply detract from the piece you’re showing off. Reserve a single wall for their installation and make sure to give it plenty of breathing room on either side from adjacent walls.

Image Source: Grant K Gibson Interior Design

Whilst we’ve given you some rules of thumb, in the world of art, sometimes rules are meant to be broken!

Move things around, try things out and have a bit of fun! When an artwork really finds its home, trust me, you’ll know.

Don’t forget to take a look at the constantly evolving collection of artwork on ArtsHaus.

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