The Beauty of Custom Murals. Murals are a dramatic way to transform interior and exterior spaces. Custom murals are one-of-a-kind paintings that create a desired ambience. Unlike other types of paintings or works of art, a good mural opens up the space and pulls the spectator into the scene as if the wall was not there. Our minds and senses respond to what our eyes see. There are as many styles of murals as there are artists who paint them, from folk art to lifelike seascapes, landscapes and trompe l’oeil. When you feel as if you can step through a painted doorway into a different place—this is trompe l’oeil. This grand illusion fools the eye and mind into believing that the area is open and spacious. It gives the viewer the same sensation they would have if the scene were real.

Picture an open window, looking out onto a beautiful sea view, where you currently have a solid wall. Visualize an open doorway to a private tropical garden, where in reality the other side of the wall may contain the laundry or bathroom. Imagine a green sea turtle, dolphin and reef fish swimming around in your pool. This 3-D illusion is what a good muralist can achieve. Combine trompe l’oeil with the handsome, monochromatic grisaille to adorn a terrace with beautiful marble sculptures, architectural columns and stone arches. Your guests will say, “Wow!” and talk endlessly about how they were fooled.

Before the Mural
In the first example, the owners wanted an entry that set the mood to their home, adding beauty and exuding a sense of tranquility. They also wanted to provide an area where they could display a new bronze sculpture, disguise two architectural niches flanking the front door and correct a badly stained and paint-splattered driveway that led to the entry’s floor tile.

Although this home is a handsome villa with outstanding sea views, first impressions did not betray this. Guests entered the property through high-security gates, driving down a narrow driveway carved out between a barren rocky hillside and the back of the house, dead-ending at a large blank wall. There was not enough room for potted plants, which would have added some colour, and the hillside could not be landscaped to soften the starkness. This harsh cold entry was not consistent with the grand appeal of the house, nor was it radiating the warm welcome the owners wanted to extend to their guests.

They called, and we met to discuss style options and the mood they wanted to convey. The result is a tropical garden surrounding the entry, leading the eye to distant horizons and through garden gates that open to serene sunlight-dappled trails, along with a cobblestone area to display the bronze sculpture. This lush garden does not need water or weeding, it is all paint—even the gates and cobblestone.

Finished Mural (one of three walls)
The garden gate, tropical flowers and cobblestone path are all illusions created in paint. Murals are an excellent way to blend old and new architectures, enhance period styles or decorating schemes, add fantasy, charm and wit, or bring out facets of your personality. That old slab concrete floor can become a worn cobblestone path scattered with tufts of moss and small orchids. Or perhaps a floor of polished marble is more to your liking. Concrete columns, retextured and painted, can become sleek marble columns or ancient sun-baked stone.

Throughout the centuries, the mural’s purpose has remained true, but as with everything else, modern technology has expanded and enhanced it to almost limitless possibilities. Paint has also evolved. It is no longer a simple mix of water, slaked lime and pigment; new exterior paints are helping to produce murals of the most radiant colours that can last for years, even in the tropics. The possibilities are as boundless as the imagination is creative, even underwater. Newly developed pool paints allow a muralist to add interest and depth to any pool. Just imagine the reactions from your guests at seeing shadowy sharks lurking at the bottom of your pool, or dolphins playfully circling a mermaid.

Murals can completely transform a large wall or serve as a solution to a minor cosmetic problem. Small murals are often the perfect solution to cover nasty repairs in the house or following repairs to the pool when replastering the entire pool is not required.

The new murals created on tile are perfect for high-traffic locations such as restaurants, lobbies and rental properties. Murals created on tumbled stone, glass and ceramic tile are beautiful, practical and impervious to the elements, yet retain the luminous colours and detail of an original painting. Designed for use in interior and exterior applications, tile murals are ideal for a unique colourful backsplash in the kitchen or bath, or installed in a water fountain, shower, spa or even on the pool floor. Tile murals can be custom ordered by selecting a painting, then choosing from a variety of base tiles, textures and sizes, and determining the overall finished dimensions (from a single tile to a billboard-sized mural). The end creation is a customized mural, delivered and ready for a contractor to install in a snap.

A professional muralist can help you visualize and create the perfect ambience for your home or business, inside or out. Murals are fantasy; imagination is the key.

Savanna Redman
www.savanna-art.com
284 494 0183