1. Start by downloading your digital images. Print them onto contact sheets so you can choose your favorites.

2. Love them all? Try organizing by subject. You can group your photos by vacation, scenery, or decade.

3. Choose a display wall and take careful measurements. Measure at least twice—this saves time and frustration later. Use a piece of plain masking tape to mark the eye-level center point of the wall.

4. Pack up your picks and head to the frame shop. Be sure to make an appointment. You’ll need a couple of hours to explore the options.

5. Make a plan. We chose all-white frames to complement a mostly black-and-white color scheme. Then we mixed in a few color photos with prominent touches of blue for graphic appeal.

6. Tie all the elements together. Mix and match moldings and sizes, using a flat surface at the frame shop to plot out a preliminary arrangement. Our vignette consists of all-white mats enclosed by four frame styles in a range of sizes. When you decide on just the right placement, make a sketch of your layout to use as a guide at home.

7. Plot it out. First, lay out your design on the floor. Tighten it up by creating consistent spacing between frames (we chose 3 inches). Next, measure the layout from top to bottom to find its center point. This will match up with the piece of masking tape you put on your wall earlier.

8. Connect the dots. Measure and write down the distance from the center point of your layout to the top of each frame. Place a piece of blue painter’s tape on the wall to mark where each frame will hang.

9. Use the designers’ trick. Pull up the picture wire behind each frame and measure the distance from the top of the taut wire to the top of the frame. If it’s 2 inches, just drop each piece of tape 2 inches and you’ll know exactly where to place your nails or picture hooks. Now you’re good to go.

10. Grab your tools. You’ll need a stable ladder, measuring tape, level, hammer, nails or picture hooks—and a friend.

Composition Tips
Create visual interest. Choose an odd number of prints, then mix sizes of images and styles of frames.

Keep in mind the scale of your room. If you have a large wall, choose large frames. For smaller areas, scale down.

Balance your arrangement. Weigh big versus small and ornate versus simple.

Add calm to the chaos. Our collage may look random, but we lined up some tops and some bottoms. On the left-hand stack of three, we based our line on each image’s center. Most other spaces are 3 inches.

Frames from Larson-Juhl; larsonjuhl.com

...or Save!
Have limited wall space? Not ready to commit to a permanent display? Create a rotating gallery with a bulletin board instead. For a more portable option, build your own album. We like the ones you can design online with hundreds of photos, customized color, layout choices, and text. Our favorite sites include shutterfly.com/photobooks and apple.com/ilife/iphoto/features/books.html.