Most rooms look more welcoming if they contain pictures. These need be expensive originals; reproduction prints and posters can be every bit as attractive and effective. But, whether a valuable family heirloom or a cheap and cheerful poster, a picture must be hung where it can be easily seen and enjoyed. The mistake most often made is to hang pictures too high. As well as bring impossible to see without craning your neck, pictures hung too high can make the viewer feel a bit like a dwarf.

Not only should a picture be hung at the right level, it should also relate to other objects in the room. A picture hung on an otherwise empty wall often seems lost and unconnected, as if it arrived there by accident. Instead, place a picture above a table, sofa, desk, sideboard, bookcase or fireplace, fact, any piece of furniture or architectural detail that will visually anchor it. Large painting or posters can command a blank wall, but again, few people have pictures big enough to stand on their own.

You can hang a picture centrally above a piece of furniture, or remember, if all the pictures in a room are hung in the same way. Each centered above a piece of furniture, for instance. The effect can be boring. Try hanging one or two off-center. When it comes to grouping pictures, before banging holes in the wall, think about how they relate to one another. If the group has a strong subject theme, animals or children perhaps, a variety of media, shapes and frames can be mixed together very successfully.