At home: A bedroom picture shelf

I'm ridiculously obsessed with pictures and prints. You know when you go round to someone's house and they don't have anything on the walls? Yeah, I find that really weird. My walls are crammed with photographs, posters, screenprints... you name it, I'll have framed it. So it was odd that for a very long time I had a huge blank wall above the bed.

In the end, it became a case of needs must: Thomas needed somewhere to store books as there's no room for a bedside table on his side, and I wanted somewhere for a plant and a few other bits and pieces I'd been collecting. So instead of a standard wall of pictures, we decided on a picture shelf. We could have opted for a specialist picture shelf but they're usually too narrow for books, so instead we went for normal shelving timber and brackets from B&Q. In the absence of the usual ridge on a picture shelf that stops the frames sliding off or toppling onto sleeping people, I've secured each one with a couple of sticky pads.

With fantastic timing, just as I was finishing up buying the timber eFrame got in touch with me to ask if I'd be interested in trying out a couple of their frames. eFrame offer a range of standard picture frames but of more interest to me was their custom framing service, which is especially handy when you have hard-to-frame prints and pictures in non-standard sizes or shapes.

I was especially keen to try their new Print & Frame service and had spied a printable PDF on Etsy featuring a line from Thomas's favourite song, Go Your Own Way, as a pretty art print. This seemed like a great opportunity to have it professionally printed and framed. The website allowed me to play around with different options for the frame, the mount and the size of the image: in the end, I went for a simple white frame with narrow white mount, and I love how it looks. I also popped a second frame - without mount - into the shopping basket, this one for my 30cm² Screw The Patriarchy print, which wouldn't fit into a standard off-the-shelf frame.

I was really impressed with the service I received from eFrame. Everyone I dealt with (there were some delivery issues - entirely my own fault, I hasten to add - so I had to get in touch a few times) was super friendly and lovely, and the frames themselves are great quality and a very good price for custom framing. I'd heartily recommend their service next time you have something tricky to frame.

Details: 

Timber & shelf brackets - B&Q

Aloe Vera plant - Ikea (in an old pot)

Vintage shop sign 'K' - Bringing The Outside In, Holkham, Norfolk (it might be a little weird to have a letter that doesn't occur in either of our names, but k is the first letter of my mum's maiden name, a name (and family) which is very important to me)

You Can Go Your Own Way printable PDF - Etsy

Screw The Patriarchy print - Redbubble

It's A Wonderful Life poster - eBay

Black Ribba frames - all Ikea
Small white frame - Wilko
Custom square frames - eFrame

Disclosure: eFrame gifted me the two frames in exchange for an honest review, but all opinions are entirely my own. No, really... I would never be less than honest even when getting something for free (I think my rather scathing reviews of some of the free books I've received makes that clear!).