Artist Emily Schoen, as photographed by Marta Perez for The Everygirl.

Our team was delighted to spot AW artist Emily Schoen featured on The Everygirl! We love her effortless mix of vintage and modern pieces, and admire the soulful feel she has created in her home. The Artful Review caught up with Emily to discuss decorating, arranging a gallery wall, and growing up with art.

THE ARTFUL REVIEW: What do you look for when choosing art?

EMILY SCHOEN: I start with pieces that I love and that have meaning behind them. I found a landscape of Montana (my husband lived out there for awhile and loved it) and that piece—along with the colors in the rest of our home—helped me to determine the color scheme for the rest of the gallery. I like mixing different styles of art, like rich oil paintings with simple line drawings. Using the wall designer feature on Artfully Walls really helped me to see the scale of the pieces together and how the styles and colors all worked together.

AR: We absolutely love how you incorporated a TV into your gallery wall! What inspired you and how did you go about setting it up?

ES: Thank you! Having a TV in the living room is a part of our lifestyle so I knew I would have to decorate around it. I also knew that I wanted a really chic gallery wall in our apartment (like the cool gallery walls in J.Crew stores) and this was the perfect wall for it! Scale is really important so I started by choosing a very large piece that is similar in size to the TV, which helped to downplay it. Next, I choose the size of all of the other pieces by just playing around with Wall Designer and seeing what looked best together. This tool was so helpful not only in choosing the sizes but also for the matte and frame options. Once all of the pieces arrived, I started by putting the largest piece on the wall and then placed everything else around it. I was also sure to have the TV overlapping some of the pieces, to make it feel like a part of the collection.

AR: What tips do you have for decorating a soulful home on a budget?

ES: Shop vintage! It really is a great way to get beautiful, high quality pieces at great prices. The more patina on pieces the better. Patina adds soul to a space.

AR: Both you AND your mother are artists on Artfully Walls! How did art play a role in your home growing up?

ES: Art played a HUGE role in my childhood! To this day I get made fun of by friends because I have never seen so many of the iconic Disney movies that they all spent their childhood watching. Instead of setting us up in front of the tv, my mom would set us up with an art project. She would grab some vases, a pear and candle and tell us to draw a sill life. Or she would put out a box of popsicle sticks and a hot glue gun and we would go to town! I love that I don't know these movies, and instead I get inspired from the world around me and I think about how I can create something. My mother is an extremely talented artist in multiple mediums and she comes by it honestly- her entire side of our family is really creative. Her father was a stained glass artist and her brother has an elaborate wood working studio in his garage. I love this about my childhood and my heritage- I wouldn't change a thing!