Whether you’re hiking in the Alps or simply relaxing at home with your family, your life is worth documenting. Plenty of us would describe ourselves as “boring”, but boring is a relative term; one person might get their thrills from kayaking down a rushing river, while others feel the same joy simply from looking at their family or watching a particularly satisfying movie.
Wherever you get your excitement from, there are plenty of ways you can translate it into pictures for your home. While you could simply cover your walls with generic art and store-bought pictures, that won’t tell guests your full story and it won’t feel as compelling to look at when you’re in the mood for reminiscing. Here are some ways you can transfer the experiences and emotions of your life into pictures for your home.
Custom family photography
Nothing makes a house more homely than a set of pictures of one’s family. Whether it’s your partner smiling into the lens, your children bsehaving crazily during a mad photoshoot or your pet sitting primly for the first time in their lives, you’ll always be able to look back on the memories of a family photoshoot and smile. Photography studios such as this one are a great place to start; studios which offer competitive rates and talented photographers with a real eye for the personality of your family. If you don’t have a partner or children, no problem; your pet can just as easily be the star of their very own professional photoshoot, and there’s no feeling quite as satisfying as seeing the beauty of your best furry friend reproduced in high-quality snapshots for your mantelpiece.
Custom art
This one might be a little more niche, but rather than opting for the paintings and pictures sold by major chains which are likely to end up in everyone’s home, why not ask around and see if any of your friends would be willing to provide art for you? You could even commission a specific scene or picture if there’s a particular experience in your life you’d like reproduced. Even if you’re simply sourcing art your friends have already completed, installing art by people you know adds an intensely personal touch to your home and makes it that much more unique. Your friends are a huge part of your life, so displaying their art is not only an honour for them, it’s also a great way to communicate your personality and lived experience. If you’re an artist yourself, then displaying your work is a no-brainer.
Photos from trips
When you took that trip to the Grand Canyon, you might have thought the photos were just there to remind you of the good times, but they’d also make breathtaking scenes for your walls. When you’ve got guests over, you can watch as they marvel at the depth and vastness of the Canyon, then step in and tell them it was you who took the picture. Nothing communicates life experience better than a photograph from a particularly memorable trip or holiday; that safari in Kenya where you managed to snap an unforgettable photo of a lion in repose doesn’t have to just be a memory for you.
Photos from your past
If you like to look back on days gone by, there’s no better way to do so than to display photos from your past. Graduation photos, wedding pictures and early snapshots of you and your budding family are all excellent candidates, but try to think outside the box a little. Think about what truly makes you “you”. Would you like to display the same bride-and-groom photo that you’ve seen in your friends’ homes, or is there perhaps a more idiosyncratic wedding picture that might sum you up better? Is the professional, posed picture of you clutching your degree the one you want to opt for, or is there a photo from the celebrations afterwards that more succinctly captures the emotion of the day? Don’t just display the pictures you think you should; be creative and you’ll always be surrounded by memories you want to relive again and again.
Your favourite artists
If you’re too private a person to put your life on display, or if you just don’t want to show off photographs, that’s fine. Think about who your favourite artists are; displaying a selection of their work will also tell people who you are and what you’re about at a glance. If you’re a fan of the surrealism of Dali and Picasso, try to find some lesser-known works by those artists to provoke conversation in guests. If you prefer more straight-laced Renaissance portraits, then opt for those; if you’re more of a modern abstract art type, there are excellent works by Rothko and Pollock that would suit your home perfectly. Even if you’re not displaying your own personal experiences, the artists you love can still help you to create a unique and personal mood in your home.
