Last week we shared tips about  different ways to hang art on your walls. This week’s post will help you determine  how to  pick art that’s the right size for your wall. This is easy to do if you follow the simple instructions  shared  below,  accompanied by  images from an early interior design project in New Delhi.

When I started out in the world of interior design, determining the right size of art on a wall was somewhat   challenging. In most cases I judged by instinct and still prefer doing so when at site on projects with flexible deadlines. However, when doing long distance consultancies or on projects where our team cannot be present, we determine the size of art through computer aided drawings or by using a simple formula that’s worked well for us so far. It’s a formula I  spotted  years ago online. I cannot seem to find the source for it any longer, but hope it makes the experience of placing art on your walls easier, as it did mine.

This is a simple calculation that helps put the Golden Mean to use while placing art.  The Golden Ratio, Golden Mean, Phi or the Divine Proportion is quite simply  a mathematical ratio. The ratio of the golden mean is represented by the Greek letter phi  and is 1.618   It  produces symmetry, harmony and balance in design and  is  found in nature. You can read more about it here.

An image from a living room in New Delhi demonstrates how we put The Golden Mean to use while hanging art.   Our couch was  6 ft wide. We converted this  into inches ( 72″)  and multiplied the number by  0.618.  The number that you get (3.77′ in this case)  is  area  of the wall behind the sofa that the art ideally  needs to cover for  a balanced effect. You can  refer to our previous post for more details about  the optimal height of  a piece of art from the top of a bed or sofa. This was placed at 14″ because it looked best at that height for the space we were designing.

You can use this easy  calculation anytime you’re unsure about what proportion of a wall needs to be covered. Or, when you can’t figure what 60-70%  of the wall space is, as many websites might  advise a person looking for help with  the ideal size of art on their walls. Happy decorating!

This is a picture of  work in progress  at a site in New Delhi.  We changed the light shades as you can tell and used  newspaper cut outs to be double sure that the proportion and placement of art on the wall were in balance with the rest of the room.

We first took into consideration the measurement of the length of all the furniture against this wall to determine the area for art placements. Then to be absolutely sure, we placed newspaper cut outs on the walls, followed by paper prints of  botanicals and finally the framed pictures.