How to hang a painting

Where the picture belongs on the wall, and the fixings that hold it there.

There is one rule that governs almost every wall: the centre of the picture sits at about 145 to 155 centimetres from the floor. That is roughly the middle of an average adult eye when standing, and it is the height used in most galleries and museums for a reason. A painting hung this way meets you at the level of your face, so the picture reads as company rather than decoration.

The number moves with the room. In a house of tall people, lift the centre-line a little. In a room where you sit more than you stand, a dining room or a snug, drop it three or four centimetres so the picture meets a seated eye. What matters is that a whole wall of pictures shares one centre-line; the eye reads consistency long before it reads height.

Above a sofa, a console, a bed or a sideboard, use the two-thirds rule: the width of the painting is about two thirds of the width of the furniture below it. A 180-centimetre sofa asks for a picture about 120 centimetres wide, or a pair of smaller works that add up to about that width when spaced. Leave 15 to 25 centimetres of clear wall between the top of the furniture and the bottom of the frame; less than that and the painting looks squashed, more and it looks stranded.

For a group of pictures on one wall, hang them as if they share one long central line, either horizontal or slightly angled to a stair. Gaps of 5 to 8 centimetres between frames feel calm; smaller feels crowded, larger fractures the group. Lay the arrangement on the floor first, take a photograph, then trace each frame onto paper and blu-tack the paper to the wall to try the arrangement without a single hole.

Fixings should be picked by weight, not by frame. Paintings under 5 kilograms can hang on a single picture hook nailed through plaster. Between 5 and 15 kilograms, use a heavy-duty picture hook or a screw into a wall plug rated for that weight; for wider pieces, use two hooks set a third of the way in from each edge, so the frame cannot drift out of level. Above 15 kilograms, particularly for framed and glazed works, use two screws through wall plugs rated to at least 20 kilograms each; for a stud wall, hit the studs. If the wall is old plaster or a partition wall of unknown age, ask a picture-hanger; a heavy painting on a poor fixing is a slow accident.

Keep paintings out of two places, however good the composition looks there. The first is directly above a radiator or a wood-burner, because the air rising off the heat carries dust and dries the paint. The second is a wall that catches direct sun for more than an hour a day, which will fade almost any pigment over years. If the room only offers a sunlit wall, hang the work outside the direct beam and use a picture light, or fit a UV-filtering film to the window.

For a wall you plan to change often, invest in a picture rail: a thin brass or wooden rail fixed 20 to 30 centimetres below the ceiling, from which paintings hang on cord or chain. It lets you move the whole room without a hole for every change. The studio’s own wall studio lets you rehearse a hang online at true scale before you commit; it is the same rule set, made visible.

Michael, for the studio