Everyone these days has a huge amount of electrical cables in their homes and there’s no sign of that changing anytime soon.
Instead of tucking them away or laying them in boring lines along your skirting board, embrace the wires and create some great designs around your home out of those loose cables.
How to fix cables to your wall:
- Cable wall clips are designed to fix cables semi-permanently to your wall
- Thin wires can be fixed by clear adhesive wall hooks
- For a clean hook-less finish, wires can be fixed with superglue instead of hooks – though remember, this is permanent!
Light cords
Your lights are hugely important for your home look but invariably have a cable leading to them which can at best be unobtrusive. But why not make a feature of your cable by embracing one of this year’s biggest trends: industrial style. Team up some industrial cabling with a vintage style bulb and that ugly wiring becomes a contemporary feature to be loved. And with the industrial trend – there’s load of styles to choose from that make the most of your cords. Just like in our show home at The Mill (Canton) - where the interior team have chosen these great look industrial fittings.
Consoles
Games consoles have a fantastic sleek and futuristic design, which is usually ruined by the tangle of wires that are required to make it work. A great option is mounting the games console directly on to your wall and fixing your cables into angular designs heading to your TV for a fantastic sci fi feel.
Ethernet cables
Ethernet cables are so rarely the right length and are nearly always either pinned along the top of your skirting board or hidden away with trunking that isn’t actually more attractive. However, ethernet cables can be very flexible which makes them great for designing little art projects.
You can create a little forest of trees, drawn in cable, that grows from your skirting board – or design your own city skyline that stands proud along the bottom of your wall. These touches can bring an amazingly whimsical and fun feel to your home.
Top tips:
- Double check whether the wire you want to work with is long enough for your design
- Draw out your design gently in pencil
- Stick the cable in place with masking tape before fixing it to the wall
Decorate cables
If you have a lot of cables running around one area then you can tie them together with braided sleeving or loom tubing – not only will this keep the cables together but you can get sleeving in bold colours that can look great when attached to your wall.
Or why not add some extra decoration to your cables? A simple line of loom tubing that snakes along your wall can look fantastic if you decorate it with roosting birds, or why not add leaves to make it look like a vine? If you’re not confident with your art skills – or don’t want to draw on your walls – then you can simply cut out the shapes on coloured paper and stick them to your wall with wall-safe double-sided tape for a great bold design
Trunking
Trunking usually just runs along the top of your skirting board to hide cables from sight, but often looks just as unsightly as the cables themselves. With a little creativity you can create an abstract pattern going along your wall or even spell out words. And as you can buy trunking that sticks directly to your wall before your screw it in, you can easily try out your designs before you commit.
For more ideas on wall art inspiration check out our “creative cables” board and if we’ve inspired you to create your own, show us your creations on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest.
