When I moved into my new office a year ago, I wanted to make it mine in a way I hadn’t done in my last office, but as often happens, I was overwhelmed with such a blank slate. I wanted a way to incorporate photos of family and friends in a way that was suitable for a professional office, that didn’t include a lot of picture frames (talk about too many choices…), and that kept the photos in a place that I could enjoy them. So many of my colleagues have photos in their offices that are only visible to their visitors. I wanted these to be for me when I need a little pick-me-up or to help me escape to some of my favorite places and past vacations.
My plans often came to back to corkboard, but it didn’t seem polished enough or appropriate for the office…a little too college dorm room. Roaming the aisles of Target one night, I was struck with the inspiration to add some geometric designs, fancy push pins, and GOLD paint. All of my supplies were purchased at Target and the whole project easily came in under $20 and took me just one evening to complete. The corkboard even came with adhesive to easily hang them on the wall. 
I used painters tape to mark off random designs on each piece of corkboard, playing around with different angles and amounts of space.
I painted with the eggshell paint first, allowing about 15 minutes to dry in between coats. Since the cork soaks up paint, it took about three or four coats to get the coverage I wanted.
After the eggshell portions were dry, I removed the tape and applied new tape in different directions to mark off where I wanted the gold portions to be. Again, three or four coats of paint were needed.
I almost didn’t want to cover them with pictures once I hung them, but I love that I can see all my photos when I look up from my computer screen.
It’s so easy to change them out when I feel like it without worrying about the photos needing to fit in a certain frame or be a certain size, and since all of my photos these days are just inexpensive online prints of iPhone photos, I have a never-ending supply of new material.
LAUREN AND I HAVE BEEN BEST FRIENDS FOR OVER 20 YEARS AND SHE IS MY “GO TO” PERSON FOR ANY AND ALL THINGS CRAFTY. HER TECHNICAL MIND MIXED WITH A LOVE OF DESIGN MAKES FOR A BEAUTIFUL AND EASY EXECUTION OF WHATEVER SHE DECIDES TO CREATE.
