How To Get Free Art For Your Home (Plus, My Favorite Places To Find It!)

Wondering how to hang new art without leaving the house? Find out how trends and thriftiness collide here.

As much as we ALL love spending and splurging on new things for the home, sometimes we've gotta make what we have work! While I've been loving the beautiful landscape images in people's kitchens and other cute corners of their homes, I knew I could create the look for less. Enter - dollar store frame + stock photo site.

Read on to find out how I did it (step-by-step), and to learn how to create free artwork in your home for less.

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If you are anything like me, you've been loving the cute McGee & Co framed art (like this one) you see everywhere. It really seems like it can elevate a kitchen corner or quiet hallway. However, most of us don't have a $400-$1500 price range to splurge on art for these understated corners of our home.

How to *Legally* Get Free Artwork

As some of you may know, in my professional work as a diet technician, I've helped companies and health pros navigate the use of stock photos and videos without violating copyright laws. You can read more about that by clicking here.

Basically, for our purposes here, all you need to understand is that credit needs to be given to the artist where credit is due. Luckily, in today's day and age there are a plethora of free stock photo websites that provide photos for free. The way this works is that artists or institutions sign up to be on these sites, and the sites (in turn) pay them for their work -- either in the form of monetary payment or in the form of expanded exposure to viewers like you.

Make sense? Okay, moving on.

My Favorite Places To Find Free Artwork

I've had so much luck on Unsplash that I haven't really had to look anywhere else for the artwork I want! You can also look on any free stock photo site (Pexels, Pixabay, etc.).

The thing I like about Unsplash is that several museums and historical institutions have an account with them. This makes it easy to find antique style watercolors, prints, and other artwork without having to dig too hard.

Here are some of my go-to's when it comes to finding free prints for my home:

• Europeana

• Birmingham Museums Trust

• Boston Public Library

• McGill Library

• British Library

• New York Public Library

• Library of Congress

From historical photos to botanical prints, these accounts have nearly any kind of art you could want. And the best part? It is free to download and use in your home.

Step-By-Step Free Art How-To

1. Select a Space & Frame Size

The first step is to have the destination in mind (cliché...I know). But, really, you'll want to know what size the image is going to be and also where the image will hang.

I knew I wanted a landscape image of a landscape (nature, trees or mountains, etc.). I also knew I wanted to place this image in our small 1/2 bath, which has brushed brass details.

Luckily, I had this dollar store decor/frame from before that was destined for the trash. Even though it is gold and brown (a quick fix could be spray paint if you wanted to), the brushed brass and neutral colors in our 1/2 bath meant this frame would fit right in.

2. Next, Select the Artwork

Now that I had a size and style in mind, I could hop on Unsplash, literally just search for "art" (or browse one of the above listed accounts) and find this image from Birmingham Museums Trust. We live in a pretty rural area right now that looks a lot like this outside our window! So I knew this fit perfectly.

3. Print On Photo Paper & Trim to Size

Matte or glossy photo paper will work just fine for this step, and I selected glossy because it is what I had on hand. I also think that it catches the light at certain angles and makes the art look a LOT more expensive than it actually is :) .

For this step, you may also need to trim the photo down to size. Simply use the photo that came with the frame or a ruler to mark the area you need to remove. A paper trimmer can come in handy to get those lines nice and exact instead of hand-cutting the edges.

4. Frame & Enjoy!

So easy, right?! I didn't even have to leave the house for this tutorial and my 1/2 bath already feels classier.

Tell Us What You Think!

If you liked this tutorial, we'd love to hear your thoughts! Come find us over on Instagram @homeweekshome.