Mural Painting for Interiors: Decorate your Home in a Unique Way!

1. About the Class: [MUSIC] Hello. Today's class is about mural painting, especially for those who wants to try this for the first time. But if you are experienced in this field, you might like this class too. I decided to create this course based on this painting that I made on this tiny wall in the entrance hall, which was very pale and then personnel. Now this painting has truly elevated the mood of this place. My name is Daniela Asschieri, I'm willing to learn and guide the designers and artists. For the last year, I've been doing mural painting professionally, which makes me very happy as it's totally aligned with my lets say regular works, as my goal is basically to bring beauty and well being to people's faces. For me, mural painting is such a special work because it joins painting and decoration in a very unique way as it connects to people through motions. I'll show you what I mean with a personal example. This mural I painted on the headboard of our bedroom. I wanted here a beautiful and romantic looks something special. I've found inspiration in a sweet memory of my life. This is the vine from my parents house. There were many hummingbirds in the middle of the big flowers. For me it was so beautiful, so cheerful and magical. This is what a mural painting is about for me, it's about decorate with soul. Usually we imagine a mirror to get huge thing. This can be very scary for a start. For that as small and simple paint like this one is a great opportunity to learn the basic techniques and grow little by little, building mastering confidence to make larger works. I am totally self taught. I've been developing my own techniques through my practice. I will show you during this course what works for me, my sequence of work, my materials, my tips, things that can be very useful for those who are starting. My goal is to encourage you with a simple but a lovely painting using simple patterns such as geometric shapes, colors, branches and leaves, and doing it in a relaxed and fun way. You can be inspired by this class to make your own mural or create something in your own style, as the techniques you'll learn are tools that you can adapt your preferences. I hope you enjoyed this class because working with neuro paintings is really great. Let's get started. In the next session we will see your class project. 2. Your Class Project: Your class project is to make your own mural, which can be something very tiny and simple or like the one of the class, whatever you want. This is a fun painting. There is no rule. You can paint only the hexagons or the branches and you can stop at any moment. The secret of this work is to do it in steps in a correct sequence so you don't get lost and everything stays organized. The class is divided in sessions according to this sequence, so it's easy for you to follow the step-by-step. This mural is basically made in two layers. The background with the colored hexagons and the foreground with the branches and the leaves. The background is what gives the predominant color of the whole work. For me not to paint the whole wall in yellow, I use an artifice. I create element that will concentrate this high dose of color in a controlled way. In this case, the hexagon shapes. I really like to use this geometric shapes because it's very easy to create beautiful compositions with them just by varying the sizes and directions and there is also a practical aspect. It's easy to outline their edges with the masking tape. It's a whole set of good characteristics. To help you, I made a list with the main tips to make your work even easier and also a template with the hexagon shapes in many different sizes so you can download them in the resource part of the class. Very important, post-term mural painting in the class filter gallery. It can be finished or in progress, doesn't matter. I will love to see your work and this will also encourage other students with their paintings too. If you have any questions you can write me in the class discussion board, I'll be very happy to help you. Now, let's get to the materials of the class. 3. Materials: [MUSIC] This session I'm talking about the materials I'm going to use to paint the mural. I put the list with all the course materials to the resource part of the class. But I'll show you here each item that I'm using in this mural. What do we have here? Nothing fancy. Everything is very, very simple and cheap. Different kinds of brushes, different sizes but all of them pretty small. I have number 4, number 0 for details. All of them are synthetic and very, very much used already. I don't care if they get very, very dirty because they are really cheap and I really like them. Pencil for outlining the shapes, the hexagons and everything on the wall. This is normal pencil like HB. This here is the pencil but it's a pastel pencil which I like very much because the color is pretty light so it's easier to erase when you finish your work. Of course a soft eraser because you don't want to damage the wall and water jars. It's super-important. I like having two because they get dirty very, very fast. You don't have to be all the time going to change the water. Mixing sticks for mixing the paints, for dissolving the paint with water. The paints. This time I'm using latex paint. Yes, this is a paint for craft. This one has matte finish. Sometimes I use acrylic paint, glossy or matte finish depending on what I want. I have many different colors here. I'm not going to use all of them in this paint but it's important to have white, black, always white you're going to use a lot actually, a lot and different colors like dark green, light green, red. I like to have pink so I don't have to be mixing all the time different paints to get to some color that I want. Make sure to have some different colors. This will give you flexibility to paint anything without having too much to be mixing. What else? Sponge. This is very important because I want this paint to have some stains, some marks, and the sponge is perfect for creating these different effects. Masking tape. This is not medicine. We have to dissolve the paint because it's very thick in the vessels. Usually what I have to do, I have some small plastic vessels. If you have the ones with a lead, it's okay but if you just have this normal ones, it's perfectly okay also. We're going to put a little bit of paint here and this thing, this is water inside, water. I like using a dropper because this way I have better control of the amount of water that I'm adding to the paint. It's never a lot of water. It's a good tip. This ugly thing here, this is a very good tip for you to keep your leftovers fresh to use many times. This is a Tupperware with a lid and these vessels that doesn't have any lead, I put them all here inside. Nothing happened. I keep them here inside and then I close it. For extra safety I put them inside a plastic bag. This way I can keep this little amount of paint that are leftovers fresh to be used many, many times because I can never prepare the perfect amount of paint to paint the mural. It's always a little bit less or a little bit more which is a bit annoying. Keep in mind that it's always better to prepare more paint than less. This way you can keep it for the next paint that you're going to make. Protection and cleaning. Our cloth for cleaning the brushes. You're going to use it a lot. This one has been used many, many times. Paper towel, super useful. This one here, it has to be clean always preferably a white one but this one doesn't leave any color on the wall. It's pretty old because we're painting a vertical surface and the paint runs. To prevent bigger damages always have one of these clean and damp to quickly go there and clean as much as you can without ruining the wall. Talking about protection now. I like to use some protection glasses sometimes that protect my only two eyes against splashes of paint. It's not imperative but I like. Protection gloves to protect my nails and to protect the floor which is very important because some accidents happen and you don't even notice the paint on the floor and you just notice after some time when you are stepping all around with paint on your feet. Have some plastic or paper, something to protect the floor against some splatters. Well, I think that's it for the paint. In the next session we'll see inspiration and sketching. 4. Inspiration and Sketching: [MUSIC] In this session, I'm talking about inspiration, sketching, and intention. Every mural has some key elements as predominant color, proportion elements, shapes. But how do we start? Basically, we start by sketching, defining colorways, shapes, proportions and I will show you some simple techniques that I have developed and that I love to use. But before anything else, there is one big question that is essential to tie the whole work together. Which is, what is my intention with this work? Or what sensation do I want to bring to this place? Joy, serenity, a dream vibe, a tropical vibe. Once this is clear to me, I'll start looking for the references, inspiration for colors and elements, and shapes. Talking about colors, I can find ready-made color palettes online just by going on Google and doing a direct search, for example, calm color palettes or sunset color palettes, blue shade color palettes, and it's pretty easy to find. You can also extract color palettes from photos just by uploading a photo in an online program and it will pull out the color palette from your photo. I liked it a lot. I think it's pretty cool and about the elements and shapes, well, I love to get inspired by nature, by plants. You can also search online for images and you can also go out, take a walk in your neighborhood, and take your own photos. I really recommend it because it's a much richer experience as it involves sensations like hearing birds, feeling the sunlight and these things bring a special energy, a greater involvement, a different quality of inspiration to your work. Once you are inspired and have your references of colors, shapes, and elements, you are ready to start sketching. I have here a note sketch of a work that I did for a client. It's a study of colors and shapes and this yellow especially I like it a lot, it will bring the warmth and joy to the room that I really want. I think it's very inspiring. I want to use this hexagon element precisely because it is easy to create compositions with different color nuances, and it reminds me of a honeycomb and also cement tiles. Things that I find beautiful and bring me a nice feeling. You can do your sketches in a very relaxed way using any material like watercolor, colored crayons, and the important thing is to do it in a very relaxed and loose way, like really playing with colors and shapes. Another technique that I love is to make little colored pieces and play with them like little puzzle pieces. This is super fun and works very well to choose different color schemes and create different shapes with these small hexagons. To make these tiny pieces, you can use watercolor or colored crayons, and for the hexagon shape, you can use the template that is in the class resources [MUSIC]. You can download the PDF file, print and cut it to use in your artwork and finally, another technique, you can also photograph the wall, print, and sketch over the photo. This is something that I also love to do because it gives me a more realistic idea of size and proportion of the place. I will come back sketching again in another point of the course. I always do sketches in different moments of the process. Whenever I need to decide or create something before I paint on the wall, I really do a lot of sketches during many times of the process. Now, with all these techniques, you can start your collection of references, get inspired on a walk, take your own pictures, and start sketching for your mural. In the next session, I'll start preparing the paints. [MUSIC] 5. Preparing the paints: [MUSIC] In this session, I'm preparing the base for the whole mural, both for the background, the hexagon shapes, and for the foreground, the branches and the leaves. I am not an expert on mixing and creating colors. My murals are usually delicate and small, so I prefer to buy different colors of paints and mix them with white and black for darkening the shades and lighting. But here on Skillshare, you can find many different classes on color mixing, very good ones, and I have been watching them to learn. This mural is small, so I'm using very little amount of paint, basically half cup of each color and it's always good to prepare a bigger amount of paint, so the paint doesn't run out in the middle of the work because this is very annoying. Predicting the right amount of paint for a project is difficult at first, but with practice, you can get a better idea of it. According to my color scheme for the background, I'm basically using four colors for different shades of yellows and ocher, mixing white to make light yellow tones, and mixing yellow with brown to get to the ocher tone. To create a light color, always start with white and then the other color, little by little so you can better control the tone of the color. On the front part for the leaves, I'm using three shades of green to create some contrast. I already have this pistachio green paint. To create the lighter shades, I'll just add a little bit of white and for the olive green, I will add also a little bit of red, which takes away the liveliness of the green leaving the color more dull. To darken it, I'll let a little bit of black. For the branches always to have a little bit of contrast and depth, I'm going to work with three different shapes, medium gray, light beige, gray and light brown. Make sure to always mix a little bit of water with the paint to dissolve it because it comes up very thick usually and I like to use a dropper because I prepare it in small quantities. This is great to have a good control of the amount of water and I pay attention to the texture of the paint to be creamy and not too liquid because it can't run down the wall. You can always test the creaminess of the paint on a piece of paper before applying it on the wall. I'm not going to paint right now, but I like to prepare all the paints at once. Now I'm going to put all these things in a Tupperware to keep them fresh for later. In the next session, we'll start with the background of the mural, creating the hexagon compositions with the templates. 6. Hexagon composition: [MUSIC] In this class, we're going to make the paper hexagons, to create the background composition of the mural. To make these paper hexagons, we're going to need the following materials. [MUSIC] The first thing to do is to cut out a few hexagons in printer paper. You'll find the Resources part of the class, a PDF file, a template with hexagons in many different sizes for you to download and print, and cut, and make one hexagon in cardboard paper. This one is for outlining the shapes on the wall. It is thicker, so it's much better for the vertical surface. Makes sure to have a good amount of white paper hexagons because we're going to attach them to one another to create the composition. The masking tape can easily tear them, so it's good to have as many as possible. Now I'm going to take all of them to the floor. Here on the floor, I can have a better overview of the pieces. I also can be more relaxed. So I'm going to experiment, play around with these shapes and create different compositions. [MUSIC] I just go experimenting, joining, moving, turning the pieces until I get the shape that I really like. I think I like this look here, so now I'm going to take it to the wall and see how it looks on the place. In the next session, I'll start outlining the hexagon on the wall. [MUSIC] 7. Outlining the Hexagons on the Wall: Okay, let's start working on the wall. The first thing I have to make sure that this surface is different completely clean and free of dust. So I can use a damp clean cloth, very clean to remove all the dust before I start outlining, and I will wait a little bit some minutes for this to dry completely before I start outlining the hexagon. This wall paper is opaque, which is perfect for [inaudible] paint. But if I had a glossy finish here, I would start with a primer to make it opaque and only after that I would start painting on this surface because it has to be opaque. Now just wait for a few minutes for this to dry and I'll start outlining the hexagon. [MUSIC] Now I have my surface completely dry and completely free of dust. I can start now. Placing the composition that I have made before on the rug. I couldn't have made this here directly on the wall, but I wanted to do this on the rug. I found it easier. Now I'm going to fix this on the wall with some masking tape. It's not completely correct. It's a bit not well aligned, but doesn't matter. At this moment what I want is to check if I like what I'm seeing, like if the height is good, if I want to add any other piece. I like the way it is and I'll start outlining now. I'm using this cardboard hexagon. I place it here and it's important to check this space. For that, I can use this pencil. I will just place it here right on the corner of the hexagon, hold it and mark with my finger the end of the wall, and then it will slide down the pencil a little bit to check if it's keeping the same size and it is. So it means that I have the same distance here on this corner and this corner down, so it's perfect and then I will make the first line, and I will stop. Now I'm going to remove this composition and I'm going to place it on a visible wall. I'm going to place it here. I'm going to use this cardboard hexagon to recreate this composition. I'm going to outline the whole shape. [NOISE] I have the first one here. Now I have a second one on this place. It's very important to keep a gap. It's more or less one centimeter between each piece. This makes the composition visually lighter, and more beautiful. [NOISE] It doesn't have to be perfect, but it has to look nice. I have this one. I have outlined all the hexagon with the cardboard template and the pastel pencil. I'm going to start the paint now. So the first thing I have to limit the sides of the hexagons to be able to paint correctly inside the shapes, so I'm going to use masking tape. I wont be able to do all of them at once because there will be some overlapping here. So I will do as much as possible. So I'll put the masking tape in all the sides of the hexagons and press it very well because this is a textured wallpaper so I have to make sure that I won't have any leaking in this parts of the texture. [NOISE] I'm going to start painting 1,2,3 hexagons. It's [inaudible] they're all aligned. I'll start with this one because I had some overlapping parts here. As you can see, there is a line of the hexagon underneath the masking tape so I can't paint these others. So I will start with this three here. The next session, I'll start painting the hexagons. [MUSIC] 8. Painting the Hexagons: [MUSIC] I'm going to start the painting on these hexagon that have the masking tape. So why do I have here? I put some gloves to protect my nails. I put this ugly apron [LAUGHTER] because I wanted to protect my t-shirt yesterday I dropped a little bit of paint on it and I like a lot of these t-shirts, so I prefer to stay with the apron. I have this plastic that I'm going to put on the floor as I want to protect the floor and also any other surfaces. I have a heater here, I want to protect everything from the paint because accidents happen more than we actually want. I put the plastic protection all over the place here, I'm ready to start so you remember this color scheme that I made? I'm going to fix it here in a visible place so this can be a guide for me to choose the correct colors in the correct sequence that I want to apply here. I'm getting started, and as I said, I'm going to use this punch to paint as I want something more unique. I don't want anything too regular, too precise. One thing very important it's make sure to paint away from the masking tape so the paint won't walk underneath the masking tape and you can be sure that you have the edges of your hexagons fully protected. There are some textures here that I really want to preserve I like them a lot. I can try to remove a bit of the paint with the other side of the sponge that's not wet it's dry and I like to have some stains and some marks. I like to have different shades here of the same color, darker tones, lighter tones and I'm still keeping some of the texture here and this white parts. I like it a lot. In this part I have more orange shade so this is ongoing and I'm going to do try to paint away from the masking tape and when it's possible. I'm excited and a bit afraid. [LAUGHTER] Let's see, it's always a surprise. Maybe it's too hot the shade and if I don't like the paint at all, I can repaint of course, can always read. This part up here I'm going to do this in light yellow. Again, I will do some dabbing and some rubbing I even want to penetrate the whole texture. But it's very hard to control the paint. It goes inside and I can do pretty much nothing just hope for the best. I'm going to add the masking tape to this other one and start preparing this. As you can see, I repainted this hexagon in white as they didn't like the shade. It was too orange, too vivid, and I'm preparing a new shade, let's say an ocher shade, but more towards to brown and beige instead of oranges so I just had to repaint this in white and I'm going to start it over again. It's pretty normal changing colors during the process you will have to be open to it. It's all dry I can start now removing the masking tape. The edges are looking so beautiful. I'm so happy now with this shade this is what I wanted. Now I'll just continue painting the other hexagon now with this lighter shade of yellow [MUSIC] and I will always try to keep a little bit of this white parts of the original wallpaper and start removing now all the masking tape. Everything is dry [MUSIC] and the edges of the hexagons, they're looking so nice. I didn't have any leaking under the masking tape, it is awesome. I finished the first layer of this painting, the layer of the hexagon, the base of the mural. It's really faithful to my color scheme that I have here what do you think? In the next session, I'll start with the second part of this mural. The branches, the foreground. [MUSIC] 9. Sketching the Branches: [MUSIC] The first part of the mural is ready. Now, I'm going to start the second part, which is to add the layer of branches, leaves, and flowers, the nature. Before I start painting, I have to define what I want there, what look I want to have there. If I want something big, small, with more transparency, or more full of leaves, which shape, which size, so this is the moment to take a look at my references, my photos, and images of plants that I have. It's always important to remember that this is not a realistic paint. I'm just going to reproduce it in a simple and figurative way with my style. I'm going to make it simpler. You can just start drawing with your pencil and simple like that, any paper will serve. There is another thing that I like to do. If you have access to a printer, you can take a picture of your wall, print it, and you can draw over it, so it's pretty easy also. Next, I will take this sketch and recreate this on the wall with masking tape. 10. Outlining the Branches: [MUSIC] Now I'm going to restart working on the wall. I have my sketch here. I have chosen this one. What I'm going to do now is to recreate the branches, these arrangements that I made here. I'm going to recreate this all on the wall with masking tape. It's important to say that make sure to tape the masking tape on your clothes before you apply them on the wall, can be on your trousers or on your blouse. It's just to remove a little bit of the adhesive power of the masking tape, so that it won't damage your wall when you remove it from the wall because sometimes it can stick to the paint too strong and when you remove it, it will move the paint together. This way it will be less sticky, let's say and you won't damage your paint. Why am I using the masking tape to recreate the sketch here instead of a pencil? Two things. The masking tape will help me to see more clearly, if what I planned here will look good on the wall or not. The good thing of the masking tape is that it gives me flexibility to change and make adjustments many times without damaging the wall. I'll start recreating this shape. I want my branches to start more or less on this part. I'll just start taping the masking tape. I will more or less recreate this shape here. I want this to be very long. I know that it's not too visible because the masking tape has a very light color but I will fix this in a minute. Again, I'm just trying to reproduce the sketch. I'm not really copying it with so many details because I just want you to have an idea if it's going to look nice on the wall. Usually, my painting doesn't follow exactly my sketches. I like to do this work more intuitively. [LAUGHTER] Here I want a smaller branch and more curved. Let's say that this one can start here. I like it a lot. I know it's not visible, but I'm going to outline the masking tape with this red crayon. I prefer to use colored crayons instead of a Sharpie pen because it's easier to fix if I make a mistake on the wall. If the crayon goes out of the masking tape frames, it's easier to clean. It won't be easy, but it will be easier than cleaning the Sharpie pen. I think it's much more visible now. I like a lot this shape and this is what I'm going to use, but let's say that I wanted to see other options. I could just remove this masking tape and create other arrangements and take a picture of each one of them. This will help me to decide with more confidence which one would look better here. This is another good thing of the masking tape. It's so flexible and so easy to use. Next step is to outline the shapes and remove the masking tape. For this, I'm going to use this pastel pencil, but I could use also a [inaudible] pencil. It's just important to make the traces very light. I will do this in a very loose way, not too concerned with details. The main branches are outlined in pastel pencil. It's ready. In the next session, I'll start painting the branches. [MUSIC] 11. Painting the Branches: [MUSIC] Everything is said, all the protections are here. I'm going to put the glasses in a minute. I'm going to start to paint the main branches, and I will add all their little branches little by little as I feel the need. I'm just going to start now with the medium brown, and then I will add the other two shades of brown, more beige, actually; beige, gray to add a darker shade and a lighter shade to create contrast and a little sense of depth. I'll distance myself from the painting from time-to-time to check if everything is looking nice, if it's all in harmony, if it's beautiful, it's very important to walk away from time-to-time to see the whole thing. I start painting the branch with the medium brown. I'm using here, the round brush number 4. I just go following the line that I have outlined previously with the pastel pencil. If I make any mistake here, I'm not worried because I can always fix with white paint. Or actually this is a very free painting, so if I make a little mistake here and there, it doesn't matter because the branches are not straight, so it's perfectly fine. As I said before when I was painting the yellow hexagons, this is the textured wall, so I may leave some white parts here and this is totally fine. I think it's beautiful also. There's another thing. This is a textured wallpaper, so it's not possible to make anything perfect here because of this rough texture. I think it's totally fine. Just have to make sure here for the paint to be creamy and not liquid so it doesn't run down the wall. I just go painting little by little. I prefer to start with thinner brush strokes and then linking the branch thicker and thicker and slowly, so I can have a better control of what I'm doing. No hurry at this point. This is a delicate painting, so just go little by little. I think that the branches are looking nice. I'm not adding more branches, I think it's already enough. What I'm going to do now, I used the medium brown here, so I'm going to add a little contrast. I will use darker shades for the lower parts and a lighter shade for the upper parts to make contrasty, like if we had our light coming from above. But it's a figurative painting, it's not a realistic, so not over detail it. The lighter tone is a simple detail that makes a big difference. It gives an idea of a brightness, of a certain light coming from above. Now I'm heading to darker tone, and with that, the branches start to stand out even more from the wall having more depth. I could stop right here and leave only the branches with this yellow background. I think it's already very beautiful. It will be something more minimalist. I finished the branches, I think they are looking super nice. Three different shades of beige, browns, grays. In the next session, I'm painting the leaves. 12. Adding the Leaves: [MUSIC] Now I'm going to start the leaves. I want to do something that resembles an olive tree. It will be a precise olive tree, but it's inspired than an olive tree. Though I will have some very long leaves here, and like the branches, I'm going to use three different shades of olive green. I will start with the lighter shades, then I will use the medium shade, and then will finish with the darker shade, and then I will add some little details. Let's start. I start here by painting with the round brush number 4, using the lightest shade of green. I'm going to preserve the texture of the wall, I won't fill the leaf with paint as I want to have a lighter look. I want to have a natural and loose painting, nothing realistic or too detailed. The leaves of the olive tree grow in several directions, I will try to do the same thing here, and with that the leaves will have different sizes. [MUSIC] I will not fill everything with light green leaves, I need to leave space to make the leaves of other colors, and I don't want this to be too full, so I'll leave enough space between the leaves. The leaves are many, but they're simple to paint. At this stage we just need patience. I'll finish this light green tone and then I'll start with the medium green, and then the darker green, distributing it throughout the branches in a very loose and free way. The painting is totally intuitive, there is no right secrets. I finished the leaves, and as you could see, this painting was very simple, intuitive, and totally relaxed, and I think it's also visible, the importance of having three different shades for the leaves and also for the branch as it brings a lot of contrast and depth to the painting. I love it. Now, we have a lively and inviting entrance hall. Let's move now to the last part of the course. [MUSIC] 13. Final Thoughts: [MUSIC] This is the end, and I wanted to thank you very much for being here with me in this class. I hope you have enjoyed it, felt inspired, and have learned interesting things. Mural painting is a beautiful way to personalize our spaces. It's a very free work and there are many techniques to do it. As I said earlier, learning little by little, we build confidence and gain mastery to do more complex and larger paintings. I love to craft, it's my favorite hobby especially to create decorative piece with lots of colors. I have other classes here on Skillshare in this subject, like painting tropical leaves with watercolor, making a 3D Mandala. If you want it to be updated about new classes, follow me by hitting the button, "Follow". Most importantly, if you liked this class, please leave a review on my page. It's so precious to me getting to know your thoughts about the class and it helps me a lot on the platform and helps other students too. Well, thanks a lot and I hope to see you soon.