Decorating With Maps: DIY Art

For those of us that love to travel, decorating with maps is the perfect way to incorporate your passion into your decor. They are meaningful, colourful and come in a variety of designs and sizes.

There are many ways you can use maps to decorate your home. The easiest way, of course, is to frame them. I used my favourite frames, Ribbas from Ikea, for each project below.

Use maps as mats behind treasured travel photos.

Wrap small canvases in a map of a place you visited, where you used to live or somewhere you dream of seeing.

Frame a pretty map as art. Keep an eye out for decorative maps when you are traveling. I found this one while visiting Bath with my husband and parents. Every time I look at it, I am reminded of getting lost trying to find our B&B and all of us getting totally drenched in a downpour while trying to find it.

Use maps to represent milestones. I fell in love with these bespoke maps from Bombus from England. The only problem was that they are $120 and they do not ship to Canada. I made my own by using bristol board as the mat, printing small maps, cutting them in the shape of a heart and taping them on. Mine represents where my husband and I met—where we got engaged and where we got married—but you can make one to represent places you have lived, where your children were born, or favourite travel destinations.

You don't only have to decorate your walls with maps. I love the idea of using maps as wrapping paper.

Another fun idea is to spell the name of your favourite city using wooden letters and covering them with a map. This is such an easy project! Find out how to do it here.

TIP: If you do not have any maps from your travels, I recommend using map wrapping paper for these projects. Most art supply stores or stationary shops sell large sheets of paper of maps from all over the world.

I love to travel; I have been known to visit a country for two weeks only to move there for a year. Now that we have young children though, traveling means a trip to the grocery store or the playground. I love that these projects act as a reminder of adventures and the life I used to live. Not that I would trade this life for a round the world ticket. At least not today.