How To Hang Wall Plates – Step By Step Guide

Hanging wall plates are a great way to fill up empty wall space on a budget, show off unique and eclectic collections, or simply display family heirlooms or meaningful pieces. The creativity with this project is the best part because there are so many options of color schemes, patterns, and arrangements you can create on your wall!

How To Hang Wall Plates

Plates can be hung in a variety of ways (using a simple plate hanger device for each one as to still salvage the plate after use, or using a more permanent method with a less visible hanging system such as we did here).

Here we used simple elegant white plates on a bold wall for a fun contrast, but plates in various patterns and colors could definitely add an interesting element to a plain white wall. This DIY project is quite easy and fun once you get started!

Supplies you’ll need for plates wall hanger:

  • plates in various shapes, sizes, colors and patterns as desired
  • super glue
  • metal picture hangers
  • screws
  • drill with philips head screw driver bit
  • Dremel or Dremel attachment for your drill

Step by step instruction to hang plates on the wall:

wall plate hanging supplies

Step 1: Attach hangers

Start by attaching the hangers to the plates, 1 hanger per plate. Use a permanent marker to mark the spots where the hanger will attach to the plate.

wall plate hanging how to

Step 2: Dremel over the spots

Use a Dremel over the marked spots to rough up the plate which will make the glue more likely to stick.

Step 3: Add glue

Drop one drop of super glue over each of the spots where you will attach the hanger and firmly place the hanger to the plate. Let dry for at least 30 minutes. Test the adherence once dry by lightly picking up the plate by the hanger. The hanger should be firmly attached to the plate.

hanging wall plates

Step 4: Create your wall art

Once the plates are dry it is time to hang them up on the wall! Here we used a screw to hang on. This is much more sturdy than a nail so a screw or a hanger would be best. Plate the plate on the screw by the hanger and ensure that the screw is not sticking out too far so that the plates lay flat against the wall.

wall plates

For the design, start with a central plate and build from there. Or mark out all of the places where you will hang each plate first. You may want to place all of your nails before putting plates up to avoid knocking any plates off while placing screws.

It is helpful, you could trace each plate on craft paper for size and arrange them up on the wall with tape first to get an idea of your compilation prior to placing screws.

If you go with a symmetrical arrangement ensure that you have measured the distance between each plate rather than the screws in case your plates vary in sizes. This is the fun part! Once all the screws are up your plates are ready to be hung and admired!

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creating a wall of hanging plates