When dreaming of our little boy’s nursery, I wanted it to be classic, unique and fun. A place for him to sleep and play, grow and learn. I dreamt of a large wallpaper accent wall yet had trouble finding exactly what I had in mind. I did stumble upon one wallpaper I was in love with and didn’t cost an arm and a leg, but it ended up not working out. Long story short – we opted for this DIY Hand-Painted Accent Wall and it was the perfect easy and cheap wallpaper alternative! Check out this under $20, 20 minute tutorial!
No Time to Read? Click Here to Pin for Later.
As I mentioned above, this tutorial is super easy, super quick and super affordable. It only took me about 20 minutes to complete and came in right around $20. Bonus, I’m more than thrilled with the results. I really consider this DIY a win in our book.
There are a few different ways you can go with this tutorial, depending on your desired look and I will explain all of them below. First though, you need your supplies!
DIY HAND-PAINTED ACCENT WALL SUPPLIES
- Accent Color of Your Choice – we only needed about 1/2 of a sample size. depending on the size of your wall you may need more.
- Paint Brush – whatever size you choose will be about the size of your accent line. I purchased three brushes to test what size we liked best, we landed on a classic 2 inch flat chip paint brush. I’ll share more on how we picked below!
- Paper Plate – or something similar to pour some paint on while you’re painting. you can move quickly while doing this so I opted for a paper plate that was light to hold and kept the paint contained.
Like I said, very few supplies (meaning very affordable)! Since I couldn’t decide what color or brush size we wanted to use, I ended up purchasing three sample colors + three different brush sizes. I also grabbed a piece of white testing board from the hardware store (but you could also use cardboard) and practiced my strokes. I ended up going with the largest brush, I felt the other two sizes would create too many lines & make the wall look too busy. This is totally a personal choice, but I do highly recommend testing them out and seeing what works!
Once I knew what brush size and what color (the hardest part of this whole tutorial is picking a color!), the only thing left to do was start painting! I started on one side and would go top to bottom working my way across the wall. There are so many different things you can do to make this DIY Hand-Painted Accent Wall unique and your very own. When I first started I was placing the strokes closer together, but realized I wanted them a little more spread out. I was able to change it without making a big difference, so don’t worry too much.
For the actual brush strokes, I did two different techniques to keep it from looking too uniform. First, I dipped the brush into the paint almost like I was stamping it with the bottom of the bristles. I then would place the bottom of the bristles directly on the wall and slightly wiggle up and down. The second type of stroke I did was more of a traditional brush stroke. I would throw in a few of these as the paint on the brush started running low. I would just gently swipe down, creating whatever length I desired.
As far as placement – I just kept things random, trying to alternate without it looking too matchy-matchy. Some I placed closer together and some a little further apart. If you are unsure, you could start further and fewer, as you can always go back and add additional strokes.
I have seen people do multiple colors with the same technique, even layered over each other. I’ve also seen people who use a sponge instead of a paint brush or opt for a specific pattern for a true wallpaper alternative look! I saved some examples to my Home Sweet Home board over on Pinterest.
So what do you think? I am SO happy with how it turned out. His nursery is officially complete and I’m so excited to share it with you guys very, very soon. If you have any questions let me know in the comments. Also, follow along on Instagram (@RileySitton) as I’ll be sharing a little tutorial on exactly how I did this – either on IGTV or IG Stories.
Leave a Reply