How should we decorate these very tall walls?

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#Decor & Decorating#advice#painting#walls
What should Jessica do with these super tall walls?
The husband and I just bought a big house in semi-suburbs. It’s pretty bland right now (beige walls + beige tile floors = snooze) and while we’ve got plenty of ideas for making it the colorful, funky home that we want, I’m at a loss for what to do with the immense two story walls in the living room.

We’ll definitely paint them, but then what? I feel like they are calling out for something special. Anyone have any awesome decorating ideas for very tall walls? – Jessica


Homies, Jessica needs you to weigh in here: what should she do with these extremely tall walls? What have YOU done with your massively high walls?

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Comments on How should we decorate these very tall walls?

  1. Ah, man, you guys have so many good ideas! I have so many things going through my head now. It’ll just be a matter of picking one (or two) and doing it. Thanks, homies!

  3. Happy story about unconventional wall decorations for awkward spaces: as a former Brooklyn girl, I remember when the Park Slope Food Co-op installed a new neon sign (back in the 90s). Of course that meant that they threw away (!) their old long, metal sign dating back to 1973. My mother thought “oh hell no,” collected it, and brought it back to her super-long hallway. A few years ago she moved apartments, and guess what? The co-op is thrilled that someone saved the sign, and we gave it back to be proudly displayed inside the building 🙂

  5. Oh man, have you ever seen a car with flip paint? It looks one colour fromone angle and fades through shades to another colour. If it’s even achievable on walls, it would look so cool! You could watch the colour change as you walked upstairs!

  6. My condo has 20ft. walls so I know exactly what you’re talking about. Luckily for me, I have four ginormous windows on my north-facing wall…so that takes up plenty of space. Here are things I would suggest:

    – focus wall painted in a fun scheme (patterns like geometric, ombre, colour-blocking, horizontal stripes, dots)
    – cool wallpaper/wall decals (a densely patterned wallpaper, or massive wall decals)
    – huge fuckin’ art (my husband has taken to getting some of his photography blown up onto canvas or large prints, and then framed with a thick matte and a thick, flat bold coloured frame).

    And here’s an idea that’s not for the wall but will help use the space:

    Hanging pendant lamps. Go to a lighting store (even Ikea has great ones) and look at all of their ceiling hanging pendant pieces. Look at the big ones! Things like this:
    http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/catalog/products/90147465/
    will really help take up space.

  7. I would definitely do something with paint, like a cascading design that uses the height to its advantage (think waterfall, swirls coming down, vaults – climbing vines – things that look better *with* height) but if you’re not that good at painting designs yourself, you could get decals and stick them all the way down, or buy some boldly patterned fabric – think bold Chinese silk prints, florals, something really big – and have it hemmed so it’ll fall in a vertical tapestry, longer than it is wide.

    We did this in our bedroom (walls are not particularly high though) – we had a 1 meter-wide swath of fabric made to a length that fell from floor to ceiling, and used those 3M removeable stickies all up and down the sides so it would stick on the wall, from floor to ceiling, behind our bed. We chose a bright blue cotton fabric with a traditional Chinese floral print (http://www.google.com.tw/imgres?um=1&hl=en&sa=N&tbm=isch&tbnid=gI7wo7GVxpMGKM:&imgrefurl=http://www.creativestores.co.uk/fabricsgalore/Taiwan-Hakka-Flowers-Fabric.html&imgurl=http://www.creativestores.co.uk/images/P/fabhakkan.jpg&w=570&h=438&ei=W_dHUPWPLc7nmAWP1IHYCw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=570&sig=109459652453266509629&page=1&tbnh=158&tbnw=205&start=0&ndsp=17&ved=1t:429,r:9,s:0,i:100&tx=82&ty=67&biw=1374&bih=710) – like that.

  8. We had multiple cathedral ceilings in our old home. We hung some fabulous rugs up on the walls. They were small – only about 3 x 5 or 4 x6 but it was a great way of displaying some nice rugs that we didn’t want to walk on.

  9. On an episode of ‘The Antonio Treatment’ there was a couple with I think three story ceilings and he did an awesome mural of their kid split into four panels that covered one whole wall. It was pretty rocking

  10. I would have one really tall piece of furniture against one wall and if needed you could place something on top of it (artwork, vases, etc)>
    On the other tall wall at approx the same height I would use artwork. I’m really digging the groupings right now, something like 5 pictures vertically 4 across (20 pics grouped in vertical lines)all in the same frame, matted pics or artwork.

  13. Can’t believe no one suggested this: CLIMBING WALL. Put a strong bar at the top to hook a rope over, footholds all over the wall, get a crash mat, voila! Indoor exercise space.

  15. BIG ART. And I want to make a recommendation to people looking for good art but assuming it will be out of their budget!

    If there is an art school in your area, check and see if they have student art auctions or sales, or maybe even take a look around and see if you can find an art student who’s style you like to do a commission piece for you!

    I am an art student and I am constantly in need of money, and also, we have to make a lot of art, after a while I sell it just because I have no where to store it.

    You might manage to get some really awesome OOAK art! Maybe even by someone who might be famous someday! 🙂

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