The keys arrive before the furniture does. You have a signed lease, a bare wall behind a front desk, and a nagging sense that something should be hanging there before the first client walks in. Choosing office wall art for a business is not the same job as choosing a print for a living room: there is more wall, more passing traffic, and people look at it while they wait rather than while they relax.
What follows runs room by room, then through the practical parts. Reception and meeting rooms first, then a café or restaurant, then rentals and fit-outs. After that comes sizing for a wall much larger than a domestic one, an honest look at what holds up under daily traffic, and how to buy a run of pieces that read as one decision.
The short version
- Visitors read the wall behind reception first, so that is where the piece with the most detail belongs.
- In a cafe, art is read from a chair, so it sits lower than standing height.
- Steam from a coffee machine, heat from a cooktop and direct sunlight are all hard on prints, so keep art clear of all three.
- Framed prints are fronted in perspex, while canvas has no glazing, so nothing reflects across the face.
- Two 50 x 70 cm canvases, or one 70 x 100 cm piece, will carry a large wall on their own.
- Buy five or more of a single artwork and the quantity pricing on the product page lowers the per-piece price.
Office wall art earns its keep at reception
A visitor stands at your front desk with nothing to do but look at what hangs behind it. Visitors look at reception and the meeting rooms first, and while they do they are working out what kind of business you run. Art in those rooms is read from a few steps away rather than from a sofa, so a piece with detail in it holds attention better than one broad flat shape.
Corridors ask for something else. A row of matching pieces, same size and same format, spaced evenly along the run, gives a long passage a rhythm. Repeat one artwork across several walls and the business reads as one look rather than several. Our wall art collection sets the three formats side by side, which helps when you want to compare a bare print against a framed one and a stretched canvas.
Art for a café or restaurant wall
Seated customers look up, not across. In a cafe, that means hanging the work lower than you would in a hallway, because the sightline from a chair sits under the one you have on the way in. The room then has its say: steam off a coffee machine and heat from an oven are hard on paper and frames, so keep the picture clear of both.
A framed print is fronted in perspex rather than glass, which counts in a room where chairs move and a knock is likely. The subject matter is nearly settled as well. The food and drink posters of 1890s Paris were drawn to sell what sits on your menu, and the range holds several. Jules Chéret’s Sirop Vincent (1893) works in red and cream, one lone figure lifted above an empty ground, so it reads from the doorway. Alphonse Mucha’s Biscuits Lefèvre-Utile (1896) arches a woman holding a plate of biscuits into flowers and pattern, pale enough to lighten a dark wall. Théophile-Alexandre Steinlen’s Lait Pur Stérilisé de la Vingeanne (1894) puts a child with a cup at the centre, cats settled nearby, and one red dress carrying the attention. The Rijksmuseum holds the first and third of those originals, the National Gallery of Art, Washington holds the second, and ours are prints. The vintage posters collection gathers more of the same decade.
Rentals and fit-outs: art without the damage
A rental or a short fit-out carries one rule ahead of taste: the wall has to go back the way it came. Leaning does most of the work. A framed print can rest on a sideboard, a mantel or a shelf, and a small framed piece will sit on a benchtop with no fixing at all. If the art does need hanging, read your lease terms first or put the question to the property manager, then note where the fixings went.
Then pick work that would still suit whoever comes next. Coastal landscape and calm abstract travel between uses better than anything topical. Sea Baths stays on the coast with ocean pools, boatsheds, red dunes and golden hills in a loose style, and Clay & Ink goes abstract in ochre and oxblood. Both sit easily on a plain wall, and neither depends on the furniture standing in front of it. A holiday rental asks for one more step: hang a picture of the place the house stands in, and our Range & Reef range covers Australian places from the coast to the snow country, each one in a Poster edition and a Painted edition.
Choosing a size that suits a big commercial wall
A commercial wall is not a loungeroom wall with more paint on it. Measure the wall first, then work back from the sizes the picture is actually printed in. Art prints and framed prints come in A4 (21 x 29.7 cm), A3, 30 x 40 cm, A2, 50 x 70 cm, A1, 60 x 90 cm and 70 x 100 cm. Canvas leaves out A2 and A1 and adds 40 x 50 cm, so the run is A4, A3, 30 x 40 cm, 40 x 50 cm, 50 x 70 cm, 60 x 90 cm and 70 x 100 cm. A landscape work is printed the other way round, so those two measurements trade places.
Our room photos settle the question for two common walls, and both arrangements translate straight into a business.
- Behind a reception desk: two 50 x 70 cm canvases side by side, or one 70 x 100 cm piece where the wall runs tall.
- Along a corridor: one size repeated at even spacing for the length of the run.
- In a meeting room: a 60 x 90 cm or A1 framed print on the wall that people face from the table.
- On a kitchen or back office wall: A3 (29.7 x 42 cm), which sits mid range and is the quickest size to judge in place.
- Above a waiting area sofa: the same pairing as the room photo, two 50 x 70 cm canvases.
Where a picture is made as a pair, buy the two together rather than trying to match singles later. The gallery pairs and sets range gathers the artworks built to hang as a group, which is the shortest route to a wide wall. Canvas behaves differently again: our canvas wall art range arrives stretched over a 38 mm frame, the edges carrying a mirror image of the picture rather than a white strip, so nothing is trimmed away at the sides and a large piece softens a wall that a hard frame would cut in two. Not every artwork comes in every size. A size is listed only where the composition can take a light crop to that shape and the file still holds its detail once enlarged, so judge the preview before you commit: what sits inside those edges is what arrives.
What lasts in a busy space
A busy room puts a print through more than a hallway at home does: doors, chairs, cleaning cloths, sun through glass. Materials matter less for how a piece looks on day one than for how long it keeps looking that way. An unframed art print is an archival giclée on 200gsm matte paper, and some sizes can be upgraded to a textured etching stock. A framed print arrives ready to hang, fronted in perspex rather than glass, in a slim 20 mm frame in oak look, black or white.
Canvas takes a layer out of the equation. There is no glazing and no reflection across the face, and no frame at all unless you add a float frame, which counts on a wall that faces a window. The canvas itself is 400gsm, pulled over a 38 mm frame. What no format survives is position: direct sunlight, heat from an oven or a cooktop, and damp in the air all shorten the life of a print. Hang clear of the window and out of the kitchen line, and keep the room at a steady indoor temperature.
How to order wall art for a business wall
Plan every wall in one sitting rather than a piece at a time. Art chosen as a group reads as one decision. Bought piece by piece, the same budget reads as several. A run of five or more of the same artwork brings the per-piece price down, and the product page shows the quantity pricing, which suits a fit-out that repeats one image through several rooms or carries a single large piece the length of a corridor.
Some walls need your own image instead. Where a reception wall needs a picture of your own, or a photograph belongs in a meeting room, upload the file through our custom canvas prints product. Two further options sit alongside it, framed prints and box frames, and all three print an image you send rather than one of ours. Begin with the biggest file you hold, because a small image will not stretch to a large size, and look hard at the preview before ordering.
Frequently asked questions
What art suits an office reception?
Put the piece where someone standing at the desk will read it. Reception and meeting rooms are seen first and seen up close, so a landscape or a calm abstract carries better there than one broad flat shape. A pair of 50 x 70 cm canvases, or a single 70 x 100 cm piece, fills the wall behind a desk without crowding it, and a framed print is fronted in perspex rather than glass.
What art suits a café wall?
Seated customers look up rather than across, so hang a café wall a little lower than standing eye level. Steam from the coffee machine and heat from an oven are hard on paper and frames, so keep the picture clear of both. A framed print is fronted in perspex rather than glass, and the food and drink posters of 1890s Paris give a café subject matter that matches the menu.
What wall art suits a rental property?
Work that leans rather than hangs. A framed print on a sideboard, a shelf or a benchtop needs no fixing at all, which suits a rental. If you do want to put a hole in the wall, read the lease first or raise it with the property manager. Coastal landscape and calm abstract, such as the Sea Baths and Clay & Ink ranges, stay neutral as tenants change.
Can I order several copies of one artwork?
Yes. Order five or more of one design and the per-piece price falls, with quantity pricing shown on the product page so you can judge what a longer run comes to. It is the practical way to hold one look across several rooms, and it works as well for a single large piece repeated down a corridor as for a group of smaller ones.
Can I print my own photo or image on canvas?
Yes. Our three custom products, canvas prints, framed prints and box frames, print an image or photo you upload, in the formats the range already uses. Begin with the largest file you hold, since a small image will not stretch to a large size, and check the preview crop before you order, because what shows in the preview is what prints.
How do I stop wall art fading in the sun?
Keep it out of direct sunlight, and away from heat and damp. A cooktop, an oven, a coffee machine and a window that takes the afternoon sun are all worth keeping clear of, and a steady indoor temperature helps a print last. Moving a piece beats replacing it.
