Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art Tutorial

 Quatrefoil Photo Wall Art with Gilded & Nail Head Edge, Mounted on Foam Board.

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 what I did, step by step.

What I used for this project: 

• A 36" x 36" Engineer's Blueprint copy of a high resolution photo (printed at Staples for $10.00)
• A 36"x36" quatrefoil template (printed at Office Max for around $5.00) A template can be found here, and check out the awesome mirror project while you're there!
• 2 sheets of Insulfoam 1" x 4' x 2' Insulated Sheathing (Purchased from Lowe's, $2.99 each). You could also use thinner foam board like this one found on Sugar Bee Crafts. This is another great tutorial if you'd rather go with a basic rectangle or square shape and don't mind the thinner board.
• Spray Adhesive
• Utility Knife
• Scissors
• Ribbon (I used metallic gold 1" ribbon)
• Brass Nailhead Trim (I used the individual nails rather than the type that is connected.)
• Sharpie Marker and pen
• Packing tape
• Command strip (for hanging on wall)
• Mod Podge roller (optional)

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.

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:

 

 

 

 

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


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