Blank Canvas

And by "canvas," I mean "wall."
One big wall in my dining room, to be more specific.

What, you didn't get the memo that the latest thing in chic dining room decor is a battery-powered baby swing? ;)

Since we moved into our house nearly two years ago, our dining room has been a sort of catch-all afterthought. In a fit of motivation before hosting our first Thanksgiving in 2008 I finally got around to painting the walls from the previous owners' selection of red -which was very nice, but didn't go with the rest of our decor/style at all- to the current color of slate blue (a color with which I am happily in love). I hung some basic curtain panels, displayed our china and glassware in the beautiful built-in hutch... but this long wall across from the windows has remained blank and bland.

I've brainstormed various things to hang there, but nothing has really seemed just right yet. I bought an old oil painting in a pretty, ornate frame for $5 at the Lancaster Flea Market with the intention of hanging that on the empty wall... but after resting it on our (then empty) living room mantal, I decided I liked it better there. What I would really love to hang there would be an aged, large-scale mirror, like the one in this dining room that I tore out of House Beautiful a while back.

I haven't found the right mirror yet, either in antique form or as something new that could be craftily faux-aged, and I'd like to get something up on the wall at least as a placeholder until I do.

I think the popular frame gallery is a good solution, but I waffle between a collection of mis-matched frames, hung artfully, a la -

and a nice neat grid of matching frames with coordinated images, a la -

And what to put in the frames? I bought a bunch of old maps to potentially hang in frames in the nursery before we knew that Phee was a girl (not that maps are only for boys... I just had a different vision for a girl's nursery), so I have those sitting around collecting dust. I thought maybe selecting some of the countries that my husband and I have visited together and framing those as a collection would be nice... maybe with select photos of the two of us or photos we love from those trips? I've also toyed with the idea of some vintage botanicals... but those are getting pretty ubiquitous. And I recently happened upon some beautiful butterfly images, courtesy of the New York Public Library's digital collection, which I could easily print out and frame. Hmm.

I'm so indecisive when it comes to hanging things on walls. When it comes to paint colors, I am 99% spot on with my choices and totally happy with the results. When it comes to furniture or bigger components of a room, I know what I like and what I don't without hesitation. But I always have a problem with the decor details... carefully crafted vignettes on tabletops and shelves, just the right throws and accent pillows, artfully placed knick knacks, and - probably the most difficult for me - wall decor.

I'm determined to figure out something to fill this wall. Spring is the season for projects, so I'm going to experiment and then bravely make a decision! Stay tuned...

{unfortunately/embarrassingly, I don't know the source for the two gallery wall photos - I snagged them somewhere online way before I ever thought I'd need to use them for anything other than my own little file of home decor inspiration...}