This Monterey Bay inspired Ocean Mural nursery was so much fun to create! I often write how much I love certain projects, but I REALLY LOVED this one! From the pre-planning to the execution, this project allowed me to take on new challenges. I was able to paint sea otters, seals, sea turtles, kelp, rocks, birds, and starfish all in one piece!

My clients were expecting their first child and wanted to create an under water scene in their nursery. They had great memories of traveling to Monterey Bay together and they loved sea otters and sea turtles. After discussing their vision, we decided to have the mural painted with a side view of the water, where we could have animals above and below the water line. They wanted to make sure the mural was not "cartoony," so I spent a good amount of time collecting reference materials of real otters and undersea creatures.

The project took me six and a half days to complete, plus a day for priming and planning. My clients had given me dimensions of the room, but to my surprise, the ceiling was much higher than I had imagined. It may be hard to tell in the pictures, but the room felt grand and gave me a lot of extra space to have a scene above and below the water line. I sketched out the vision for the nursery and created space for the crib and changing table to go per my client's instructions. Making sure to plan for furniture is always important. I didn't want to spend a lot of time working on the detail of a sea otter if we were only going to cover it up with a crib. You can also get creative with a piece of furniture and have otters or fish peaking over or around a certain piece.

Once the room was primed and the sketch complete, I started painting the sky. I worked my way from the top of the mural to the bottom. Luckily for me, most of the detail happened in the ocean and I didn't need to worry about moving a ladder so much.

Take a look at the step by step process below! Thank you so much for checking it out! I would love to hear from you! If you are interested in connecting or contacting me about a commission painting, click here! Have a fabulous day!

Ocean Mural by Julie Ann McKevitt | Atlanta Artist

Featured, Portfolio-Murals, UncategorizedJulie McKevittFebruary 10, 2015

Geometric Nursery Mural on the Ceiling

I absolutely LOVE how this geometric nursery mural turned out! I am always in awe of the fabulous ideas my clients present to me. This idea though came from one particularly special client, my cousin, Carmella. More like a sister, Carmella, has been my style icon since the moment I could pick out my own clothes. Even now, twenty plus years later and 400 plus miles away, I still call upon her for advice. Geometric Nursery Mural on the Ceiling

So, it was no surprise that when I offered to paint something for her nursery…this amazing idea came up! I was thinking a cute giraffe or lion, instead I painted approximately 221 gold triangles on her nursery ceiling! I couldn't be more in love with the results and her sweet baby Roman who gets to enjoy it.

Here are some pictures and notes about the process:

I arrived late in the evening in Orlando, but with only a few days to finish the project, I began painting her ceiling white. Midnight projects are always the best kind! I needed it to be dry to start the triangles the next day.

The next morning I had lofty ideas of how quickly this project was going to be. I even made a triangle stencil I thought I could easily trace across the ceiling. Geometric Nursery Mural on the Ceiling It was definitely not even enough and I needed some straight lines to reference. Usually when I do geometric patterns, I am doing them on walls where I can easily use a long level to make my guide lines. Levels don't work on ceilings! haha!

So me and my ruler got to work! I had to reference the side walls and make sure my lines were straight. I would measure the first line from the wall, then the next line from the first line, then…so on and so forth! The pattern was similar to drawing a chevron pattern (like in this tutorial). I just made sure not to have pencil marks in the area the triangles would remain white.

Geometric Nursery Mural on the Ceiling

It took me about a full day to draw the triangles. Then I started painted!! It took more than one coat, but the second coat went much faster. From late Wednesday to late Friday night I prepped and painted. By Saturday morning, it was finished!!

Geometric Nursery Mural on the Ceiling

Check out these amazing photos from Live Happy Studio of the nursery space including a few of baby Roman. It surprised me how much the ceiling mural acted like a mobile. He loved looking up at it! P.S. I'm in love with this Superheros pillow by Kal Barteski from Urban Outfitters.