How to Paint a Map Mural

Map mural in church cafe

A map mural is one of those mural themes that will look great in any room of the house. You can put a map mural in a kid’s bedroom, in a home office, in a school nursery or in a classroom. There are few places where a map mural will not look good. Here are tips on how to paint your own map mural.

Things You'll Need

• Map clip art
• Projector transparencies
• Projector
• Wall paint and/or acrylic artist paints
• Large and small paintbrushes
• Permanent fine-tip marker

Instructions

1. Search through the internet for free map or globe clip art. Choose your clip art according to where you are painting the mural and how fun or conservative you want it to be. A cartoon type map with each state divided would be fun for a classroom or kids' room and you can even label the country and states. A realistic map image would be great for more formal areas.

2. Blow up your map image the size of an 8 ½-by-11-inch sheet of paper and print it. Use a permanent fine tip marker to transfer the image onto the transparency sheet. Use the projector to project the image onto the wall and adjust the controls until you get it the size you want. If you don’t own a transparency projector you may be able to borrow one from your local church or possibly the library. You an even check online for places that rent a transparency projector in your local area.

3. Trace the map image onto the wall with a pencil. Take your time and be careful to get all of the details of the map. If you want a simple subtle map, you can just trace the shape of the countries.

4. Paint your map mural. You can paint the entire map one color. You can paint the background blue and the continents brown and/or green. You can create a brightly colored map.

Tips & Warnings

• Find a map image that fits the character of the room you plan to paint.

• If you are an inexperienced muralist, paint your map in a tone on tone color scheme like the one in the image.

• Take your time painting the mural, concentrating on getting the edges right so your mural looks like the real countries or continents.