DIY Plus Sign Accent Wall

September 28, 2018

Removable wallpaper or vinyl decals are such an amazing decor addition, especially for renters.

When we moved into our current house, I quickly became very bored of the beige walls. It was super early on, so I wasn’t sure whether or not we could paint. One night while Brian was away, I decided I wanted to decorate one of the walls in my craft room. I went on pinterest to look for rental-friendly inspiration, and saw that black vinyl wall decals were a popular option. I didn’t necessarily want to spend money, and was pretty impatient, so I found a DIY alternative!

This was a few years ago when washii tape was really popular, so there was lots of decal inspiration out there using washii tape. Some people made really cool mountain or geometric designs using washi tape, but I really liked the idea of doing a repeating pattern across the whole wall. I also didn’t have any washii tape on hand and at the time hadn’t stumbled upon black washii tape, so ended up using some electrical tape that we conveniently had on hand. It ended up sticking to the wall really well, and as I’m writing this post, it’s been up for just over two years!

SUPPLIES:

Black Electrical tape
Scissors
Ruler or tape measure
Credit card (or something to smooth down the tape)

STEP 1: PLAN + CUT

The first thing you need to do is decide what size you want the plus signs to be. I wanted them to be about 2 inches, so I started out by cutting a bunch of strips of tape and stuck them on the edge of a table to easily grab later. This design is super easy and customizable, and literally any size of the design would look good in a repeating pattern. If you didn’t want to do as much cutting, you could opt for larger plus signs and space out the design more so you have less to stick on the wall.

STEP 2: MEASURE + STICK

The next step is to decide on the spacing of the pattern and where you’re placing your decals on the wall. You can measure it all out ahead of time and use a pencil to mark where you want to place each decal, but I decided to tape and measure at the same time, because I’m lazy.

I started at the bottom left corner of our wall and stuck on the first strips of tape, starting with the vertical piece. I was a little worried that it wouldn’t stay on the wall too long, so I decided to use a credit card to smooth over the tape as soon as I stuck it to the wall. This also helps remove any air bubbles that might form.

I then used a ruler to measure the next placement space. Again, this is totally dependent on how many plus signs you actually want on your wall. If you do want it to be a little more low-key, place them further apart. To find the space for my next decal, I measured diagonally from the middle of the first sign, and ensured that the middle of the of the next vertical piece lined up with point on the ruler. It doesn’t really matter how you decide to measure, but as long as you use the same technique the whole time.