I feel like this could be a book rather than a blog post… but I got so many questions about our music room yesterday after I posted a sneak peek on Instagram that I decided to answer all of your questions in one blog post.

When decorating your home using musical instruments, it’s important to remember that first and foremost, they’re instruments. If you buy a cheap guitar without the intention of ever playing it, that’s one thing, but if you own and play an instrument, your top priority should be its care and use over anything else you do with it. Here are my other top tips for decorating using musical instruments:

1. Get good hangers/stands.

Don’t DIY your own hangers unless you’re really THAT handy. The last thing you want is your favorite guitar coming crashing down in the middle of the night because you didn’t take the time to get the right product. These are the hangers and stands I like the best:

• String Swing Violin/Viola
• String Swing Mandolin/Banjo/Ukulele/other small instrument
• Hercules Guitar/Bass Hangers
• Ingles Violin Stand
• Ingles Cello/Bass Stand
• Guitar/Electric Bass Stand

Jonny built a bass rack for his basses and cello that looks great and fits exactly what we need. He built it before we were even dating, so it’s been moved quite a few times, and it’s very light and easy to move. Maybe I can convince him to do a DIY instruction post… we’ll see.

2. Don’t use an exterior wall.

This one really doesn’t apply to electric instruments, or in all climates, but if you live in a place like Nashville, where the weather gets very hot and pretty cold at times, it’s best to keep acoustic instruments on an interior wall. Our house is older, and our windows can be drafty, so we also don’t want our instruments too near a window in winter, when the cold and low humidity can cause cracks.

This is the sneak peek into our music room–we’ve still got lots to go, but we’ve got the instruments up now! This is an interior wall,

3. Avoid air vents.

In our house, which was built in 1926, the air vents are in the floor and are very large… about 14″ square. There’s one in each room downstairs, which makes it really difficult to use the floor space sometimes. AC/heat blowing directly on instruments is bad for them, so try to avoid vents at all if you can. If you can’t, you can buy a diverter like this one to route the air away from your instruments. Or, if you’re handy, you can build one that’s a little less conspicuous like the one that Jonny built to go around the leg of the bass stand he built for the basses in our house.

4. Hang them like art.

By this, I just mean that a good rule of thumb is that the center of a piece of art should be roughly 57″ off the floor. Do what you need to do to make them usable, but make sure they’re centered on your wall so that they don’t look like an afterthought. Be intentional!

5. Do it as much as possible.

Instruments are beautiful pieces of art, and they add SO much character to a room! I think they can really tell a story and introduce different textures to a space. For that reason, I say, especially if they’ll get more love and playing being out and available, decorate with them in every room!