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Last Updated: June 2, 2018 By

Decorating With Nature: DIY Art

Some of my favorite pieces of art in our home are simple, inexpensive DIYs. I’m a crafty girl but I’m not a very good artist so I let nature be the artist by creating DIY art that incorporates natural elements. Two of my favorite pieces are the framed DIY agate slices hanging over the toilet in our powder room:

DIY art - Target frames with agate slices

The stenciled powder room walls are busy and full of pattern so I needed art that was simple to balance it out. After finding some coasters made from agate slices at a local home store (if you’re looking for a good online source try {here}), I decided that they would be the perfect subtle art for my space. I mounted the two slices in a pair of Target threshold frames for a simple but elegant look.

It’s the easiest of DIYs – I’ll share a few helpful tricks!  (post includes affiliate links – see my full disclosure statement {here}) After showing pics of my new art in our powder room, several of you were wondering how the agate slices were mounted so let’s start there. Two words – glue dots. I’ve always used {these medium-sized ZOTS} but I’m guessing that other brands of glue dots work just as well. A glue gun is another option! After deciding which side of the agate slice I wanted to display in my frame, I put several glue dots around the rim of the agate slice:

Glue Dots on Agate Slice

And I centered it in the opening of my frame (glue dots facing up):

Create your own art with agate slices

Then I simply laid a piece of white textured cardstock on top of it to create the background. The key is to first cut your cardstock to the exact height of the frame so that it doesn’t slip up and down in the frame once the agate is glued onto it.

Cardstock layered over agate slice
Since the agate slice has some dimension to it, I took the piece of cardboard that comes with the frame and cut it so that it covers everything except the middle part of frame where the agate slice is, helping to even out the depth.

Cut cardboard for back of agate slice art

Place the back of the frame on and…instant art!

Inexpensive DIY art with agate slices in Target frames

Another piece of nature that works well as stand-alone art is feathers. I used them for this little DIY piece of art that’s part of our home office gallery wall:

Gallery wall with DIY Feather Art

Using a similar idea but with a longer frame and pheasant feathers would be gorgeous! And finally, the piece of art to the left of that big ole lion head door knocker is a DIY using a preserved branch/frond that I got at Terrain.

DIY botanical art as part of gallery wall

DIY Art with Pressed Greenery

At some point, I’d love to collect some a slew of pretty flowers and leaves and create a large art wall of handmade botanicals. Pressing leaves and flowers isn’t all that difficult – there’s a good quick review of how to do it {here}.

I’d love to create a large grid of botanicals in our foyer – something like {this grouping done over a sofa}, this grid of botanicals that covers a huge portion of the wall:

Large wall of framed botanicals behind couch
For the Love of a House

or this lovely set of nine botanicals in a grid pattern:

Wall of botanical prints
Design Indulgence

It’s officially on the ever-growing spring 2015 project list!

Have a great day everyone,

Kris-Signature

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Comments

  2. Carol says

    December 17, 2014 at 7:30 am

    Great post with lots of helpful information. Thanks, Kris. Love the agates. I’m going to try even though I’m not a diy girl. They look professional! Kuddos! …and Merry Christmas.

    Reply

  6. Leigh says

    December 17, 2014 at 10:47 am

    Looks great! And thank you for a non-Christmas related post! As much as I love Christmas and am totally looking forward to it, there’s only so much decor and gift related posts I can take. I’m beginning to skip over them in my feed now; we’ve been so saturated with them since before Thanksgiving! Bah humbug and Merry Christmas!!

    Reply

    • Kris @ Driven by Decor says

      December 17, 2014 at 8:37 pm

      I’m right there with you Leigh – I LOVED all of the Christmas house tours but I’ve had my fill and am ready to move on to other things now! Hope you have a great Christmas!

      Reply

  11. keller says

    August 30, 2015 at 9:15 pm

    Hi Kris,

    I LOVE this idea!!! I’d love to try something similar in our 1/2 bath. Did your frame from Target come with the mat? Any chance you have a link to where I could buy the frames? Thanks so much!

    Reply

    • Kris Jarrett says

      September 1, 2015 at 12:24 am

      Thanks Keller! And yes, the Target frames came with the mat – unfortunately, the frames were on clearance when I bought them and are no longer available. I would still give Target a try though – they have lots of attractive, reasonably priced frames in similar sizes.

      Reply

  12. Amanda W says

    April 1, 2016 at 12:46 pm

    I’ve been looking for a way to do a set of botanical prints for our dining room on the cheap…I will have to go check out Target’s frames and give this a try! You and me….we are style soul partners me thinks haha 🙂

    Reply

  13. Sharon says

    September 6, 2016 at 1:31 pm

    I absolutely love this agate project, Kris. I’m trying to find some similar frames to yours. Target doesn’t carry the ones you have anymore. Any ideas? I love the liner framing and linen or burlap matting. They look so great together!

    Reply

    • Kris Jarrett says

      September 22, 2016 at 10:48 pm

      Sharon I’m so sorry that I’m late in seeing your comment. I’ve seen some pretty frames with linen mats at West Elm but they’re not exactly like my Target ones – I haven’t been able to find any that closely resembled those unfortunately!

      Reply