12 Modern Wall Art DIYs

Sharing DIY wall art I have in my own home to suit a modern decor style. These 12 projects will update your wall decor on a budget!

tree ring prints with text 12 diy wall art tutorials

In my home I have maybe 2 pieces of wall decor that aren’t a DIY. I love how I can get custom pieces exactly what I want in the size I want in a budget I want just with a little DIY.

When I’m working on a room makeover, sometimes I have art I know I want to work in, but most of the time… I design the big things of a room then brainstorm what kind of art would bring it all together… then I set out to make that. That works really well for me, but I know it takes having some ideas in the first place to be able to think about what might work well for your space.

diy wall decor ideas - photo of hand painted canvas over fireplace and textile art on adjacent wall

I also like to take into account what other art is around. I don’t like to have aaaalll paintings for a room decor, I like to mix it up. So in this post you’ll have quite a variety of mediums to play with!

So if you’re needing art for your home, this post will be great inspiration for you! If you’re just craving a DIY project… also super fun inspiration!

So in this post I’m sharing 12 modern wall art DIYs for you to try in your home.

Modern Tree Ring Prints

These are really popular right now and you can order prints or buy printable versions, but with needing 3 for this space, paying $40 for a print, then the cost of framing added up to a number I just wasn’t comfortable with when I knew I could make them myself.

I have a full DIY tutorial for these wood ring prints, I used wood pieces a friend had saved for her wood burning fire place, a torch, wire brush, ink, and dollar store poster board. The frames are IKEA too so I was able to get this set of three DIYed and framed for well under $100. See the full tree ring art tutorial here!

Brush Lettered Canvas

Next up is my favourite brush lettered canvas! I always get asked where I got this one and it’s definitely a DIY. I have a full blog post and video tutorial sharing how I made it and specifically how to get that textured brushy look in the lettering. This streaky kind of lettering is totally modern and ads great interest to an otherwise kind of plain quote.

I love to hand letter and just lettered this myself. If you do want to get started with brush lettering- this is a good place to start! But if you don’t feel confident, you can always find a font you like and trace it onto your canvas before using the paint for the brush lettered effect.

This one is super affordable as well- I get this larger size canvas from Jysk and they’ll often go on sale. I think regular price right now is $25 but I’ve gotten them for $15.

The lettering is made with acrylic paint and a brush and then framed with craft wood (like this). Since I got this canvas on sale, this one cost me about $35 total with the frame and paint. See the full tutorial here.

Mini Weave

I’ve made a couple of mini weaves now and they’re so fun to make and fill little nooks or corners with texture. I made these without any real weaving experience (I did do the weaving crafts in elementary school, but can we even count that?). So if it intimidates you, it’s definitely doable for beginners!

This one is also affordable, in fact the video tutorial I made for this project is part of a Dollar Store DIY Challenge so everything in it is from the dollar store! That means it comes in under $20 to make! See the tutorial video here.

affordable large scale photo art and framing a canvas

Photo Canvas Hack

This large photo canvas in my dining room is a piece I’m so in love with. I’m sure it looks like a large landscape photo canvas. But really, it’s a photo of my kids running on the beach (you can spot all 4 of them if you look closely!). Instead of just a landscape print you find online, DIY gives you a print that’s meaningful to you (with the people you love!).

If you want to try something similar, the next time you’re out somewhere that you think makes a gorgeous landscape shot, back away as far as you’re comfortable from your kids, your dog… whoever and snap a photo!

Then to keep it affordable, this is also one of those Jysk canvases and then I printed the photo as an engineering print from Staples. They don’t love when you do that, but there also aren’t rules against it.

I used spray adhesive to attach it and then light coats of a clear spray paint to seal the photo. I framed it out with craft wood and delicate moulding.

This one cost me closer to $100 once I factor in the adhesive and spray paint as well as the framing. You can see more about this DIY in the full room reveal post here!

DIY Faux Shibori Textile Art

This DIY faux shibori art was so simple to make and the texture both of the dyed fabric ,but also the raw edges make for a beautifully interesting piece of art up close- but from a distance, the colours are muted enough it looks like it belongs in our sage green kitchen.

This one I made with a scrap piece of fabric I had in my collection. It’s either linen or a coarse cotton. I did a shibori fold with cardboard and string but then dyed it just with regular dye in my sink to speed things up and avoid the mess. I framed it in a floating frame from Michaels (that I used a coupon for, of course!).

This one cost me under $30 factoring in the frame and the two colours of dye I used. See the full tutorial here!

DIY Macrame Wall Hanging

I love the look of macrame in home decor and it’s such a fun one to make! It brings such great texture to a space but keeps within that neutral colour palette I love. Macrame works so well on dark coloured walls like this, but it also rocks in light coloured spaces.

While I don’t have a specific tutorial for the whole larger wall hanging, it’s made of just 4 knots. I have a basic macrame knots tutorial right here where you can learn the knots and probably eyeball how to make the bigger guy.

I do have a simple macrame wall hanging tutorial for this smaller piece which is the first part of the larger macrame wall hanging too! See that right here.

DIY Watercolour with Line Art

This art is a great example of me finishing a room makeover and thinking it needs a little *something* so brainstorming what would suit the space. I loved the muted taupe tones in our primary bathroom makeover with pops of black and wanted to coordinate with that.

The floating frame is a cheapie from Michaels that I spray painted matte black (it was that really shiny plastic black).

I have watercolour paints and paper at all times as well as the sharpie, so this one cost me less than $20 for the frame (with a coupon, of course!). You can see the full DIY post right here!

DIY Hand Lettered Monogram

I created this piece for our dining room at our last house and now it lives on the wall heading downstairs. I love how simple it is but still so classic and beautiful. This one is in an IKEA frame and is just one sheet of multi purpose paper, then lettered with either ink and brush or a brush pen that gives similar texture (I made this so many years ago, I can’t remember for sure). This came in at under $20 for me since I had the supplies but if you had to buy the lettering supplies, it would still only hit $25.

If you haven’t tried brush lettering- it’s so fun, you can snag a free brush lettering QuickStart guide right here so you can see if you like doing it! And if you do… you can make SO MANY things for your home decor ;)

DIY Wall Flag

Because I love to mix up textures and mediums, I love that this isn’t framed art! A wall flag adds a casual cool feel to a space and can be DIYed to have any kind of phrase or picture to suit your home. I made one for my friend’s nursery with a Winnie the Pooh quote for her and I made this one for my kids playroom.

I hand lettered these on my iPad, then cut out the lettering with my Cricut to iron it on. If you don’t hand letter, you can do the same with any font that you love the look of! There’s so many beautiful hand lettered fonts out there- here’s a few I love.

This one is made on a remnant piece of curtain fabric we had hemmed for our dining room bay windows. I turned over and sewed the edges, then added rivets to the corners.

Since I had everything on hand, this one was free for me but if you were making it from scratch and needed to buy the vinyl it would probably cost around $20 for the rivets, one meter fabric and one roll of black heat transfer vinyl. You can see me make this start to finish in my playroom makeover video here!

Embroidered Photo Canvases

I love the look of the giant black and white photo canvases of kiddos in family spaces. Since these were for our playroom, I wanted to add a little extra fun to them so I’ve stitched on two of them and painted on the other two.

Adding this detailing makes them so playful and fun and I’m in love with how these turned out! It wasn’t a huge time investment, but I definitely should have gotten myself one of those rubber thimbles. Ha!

These canvases I got printed at Walmart- I just did a check and they run about $40 each then embroidery thread or craft paint is about a dollar each. You can see the full tutorial for these right here.

Modern Clay Wall Hanging DIY

This geometric clay wall hanging was so fun to make, I love the shapes which I’ve seen in many wall hangings at stores but also the texture the clay brings- imperfect and beautiful!

I haven’t finished a blog post about this one yet, but you can see the process in this short video. It’s just clay rolled out and then cut into shapes with a knife. I did use a cup to cut the circle at the bottom and then a straw to poke the holes for string before baking them. The string is just dollar store faux leather jewelry cord.

I think for the cost of clay and the dollar store leather cord, you could do this one for under $10.

DIY Textured Modern Canvas

I shared this drywall mud art (yes! you read that right) just the other day but we actually made it last summer. It’s such a fun DIY to create and the texture is truly dreamy.

It’s another one of those Jysk canvases and we just mixed drywall compound with paint that she already had at home to get the colours. We applied it with a drywall spatula and a comb (really). I framed it out with some oak trim and it looks incredible hung in her modern classic green bedroom.

This one we had the paint and drywall compound but if you only had the paint or chose to go without paint, this one would ring in around $60 including the frame moulding pieces. You can see the full DIY tutorial for this modern art right here.

See them all in video!