Erin Spain

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Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art Tutorial

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Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art Tutorial
This was a very fun but somewhat tedious project, mainly because it was very “trial and error” in nature. But I think I’ve worked out all of the kinks so you won’t have to. This particular project was very exciting for me, mainly because this is the first project I’ve made from scratch that ended up looking exactly how I had pictured it in my head. I am going to include several photos and walk you through the process of how I made it with this quatrefoil photo wall art tutorial.
Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art
What I used for this project: 

This entire project cost me around $25.00 since I had most of the supplies on-hand. If you’re wondering why I printed my photo and template at two separate places, it’s because I initially tried to have both printed at Office Max but they were going to charge me $70+ because of the amount of ink used in the photo. Staples offered the blueprint so I went with them, but my quatrefoil template came out all distorted there. So then I went back to Office Max for the quatrefoil and it worked out just fine. FYI this photo is not “photo quality” – it’s really just a black and white photocopy, but I’m perfectly happy with the way it turned out. It doesn’t look grainy or pixelated at all.

Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art

The first thing I did after I gathered all of my materials, was attach the 2 sheets of Insulfoam. Why did I need 2 sheets? Well, I knew I wanted my finished product to be 36″ x 36″, and I couldn’t find sheets of Insulfoam that were wide enough. Hence, 2 sheets attached. The good news is, they are super easy to attach. All I did was lay them side by side and use a strip of packing tape on front and back to attach them. For some reason, one sheet came with silver foily stuff on the front side and one did not. I just peeled it off. (By the way, I’m sure the technical name for it is “silver foily stuff.”)

I used 2 of these Insulfoam boards.
Attach foam boards with packing tape.

Next, I cut out my quatrefoil template and laid it in the center of my now-attached Insulfoam sheets. I laid a bunch of random objects on top of it to hold it in place and make it lay flat. I then used a Sharpie to trace the template, and cut it out with a utility knife. I basically sawed through it with the knife, carefully snapping it away little by little. I used scissors to trim away the excess and smooth out the edges.

Position your template on top of the foam board, and place random “stuff” on top of it to hold it in place.
Trace your template onto the foam board with a Sharpie.
Cut out with utility knife.
Now the foam backing is ready!

Then, I laid my quatrefoil template on top of my photo (centering it as best as I could),  traced it with a pen, and cut it out with scissors.

Center template on top of photo, place random “stuff” on top to keep it in place while you trace it.

Now, my photo was ready to be attached to the foam board. I headed out to the garage (spray adhesive can have serious fumes, so work in a well-ventilated area!), and sprayed my foam board thoroughly. I waited one minute (as instructions recommend) and then carefully positioned my photo on top of the foam board, starting at the top and slowly laying it down. I rolled it with my Mod Podge roller to make sure I got all of the little bubbles out and to prevent wrinkles, but I’m not sure that this was necessary. I could have probably just smoothed it out with my hands.

Spray with adhesive, then attach photo to foam board.

Since the paper adhered very quickly to the foam board, I couldn’t really shift it around at all. It was a teeny bit off-center, so the styrofoam showed at the edge on one side. I simply used my utility knife and some scissors to carefully trim the excess away and touch up the edges.

I tried painting the edge of the styrofoam (don’t do this – it looks gross). If you do choose to paint, use acrylic craft paint, not spray paint, as spray paint eats away at the foam. Instead of painting, I decided to use gold metallic ribbon (I used gold because this photo is going in our “modern” room over this dresser, which has gold hardware. Silver or black would look great too. I attached the ribbon using my nailhead trim. I didn’t measure, I just eye-balled where I wanted them to go and spaced them out evenly. I went through about 10 feet of ribbon. One roll made it almost all the way around. When I needed to start a new roll, I just folded the end under to create a smooth edge, and pinned it down with nailhead trim so you couldn’t tell where the old piece ended and new piece began.

Attach ribbon with nailhead trim.

After my ribbon and nailhead were in place, I was ready to hang it up! I tried attaching picture hardware to the back using both tiny nails and duct tape, but it was a disaster. I recommend double-stick tape or command strips. That’s it! You could really use this method to do any shape you’d like.

Now, for more photos of the final product:

 Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art

If you try this, please let me know! I’d love to see your results and maybe even feature it here on the blog!

Update: I switched out the ribbon when I moved this art into our boys’ bedroom.

Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art Tutorial

 

Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.

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Comments

  2. Erin, A lot of steps but it looks fantastic!! Thanks for the Tutorial, I can see some Christmas Gifts coming from this project!!

    Huggs, Nancy

    Reply

  4. hi erin! i don’t think we met at haven, but i was there, too! i just saw that you happened to start following some of the blogs i popped over to from haven and figured it must be from that, too, so came here. LOVE LOVE this project- seriously amazing! nice to meet you after the fact! 😉

    Reply

  13. Wow! This is so awesome. I just tied the knot and I’ve been brainstorming ways to display the wedding photos around my office at Dish without simply stuffing them into frames. I think this project is the answer! Thank you for including detailed instructions and pictures too! Some blogs can be so vague, so I usually find project ideas on HGTV and DIY network; that way I can record them to my Hopper DVR and replay steps when I inevitably get confused! I’m lucky it has such a large memory because I have quite a few projects stacking up. And I am definitely adding this to my DIY list. I hope I pull it off as well as you did. Keep up the good posts!

    Reply

  19. I love it! I found you on Pinterest. May suggest one change? Instead of cutting the picture out and then glueing it to the board, glue the picture to the board first. Then you’ll be able to trim the excess picture around the foam and you won’t have to worry about positioning.

    Reply

    • Thanks for the tip Lynn! I actually considered doing this but was afraid I would rip the picture if I tried cutting with an X-Acto knife and I couldn’t get close enough to the edge with scissors. But maybe this would work well for someone with better precision than I have! 🙂

      Reply

  21. Thank you Erin…for the response and the project. It really is fantastic. Your tutorials are great and I love your sense of humor.

    Reply

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