Jungle Safari Wall Mural Is About More Than Just The Room

When a community comes together to create a special place for children to learn and grow it is a truly wonderful thing. We were so very honored that Mel and Dave Clarke and the Petersham Baptist Church community in Sydney, Australia let My Wonderful Walls be a part of such a project for their parish children’s’ ministry. Mel wrote that they wanted a wall mural that would depict God’s glory and where the kids could play and learn. Something bright and colorful to inspire the children’s imagination but would be easy enough for someone with little artistic inclination to complete. Our Jungle Safari Wall Stencils achieved the look they wanted and allowed the whole church community to come together to participate!

Mel found My Wonderful Walls on Google and though a bit daunted at first to take on a DIY wall mural of this magnitude, she says the stencils allowed for adults and children both to get involved (their youngest painter was 3!) and get creative. For example, Mel notes, they have a red frog climbing up their tree. The entire project was also completed over just 2 weekends with about 30 people being involved in some way. She liked that by using wall stencils versus stickers, it allowed for more people to join in the creative process and when they were done that something more permanent was decorating the walls of their church hall. The space now encourages and reflects the creativity and imagination of children. The children who use the space love the room and enjoyed checking out all the different animals. It is truly a place to learn and create!

Though starting a project like this can be intimidating, Mel’s advice for My Wonderful Walls blog readers is to just jump in. She notes that she found the tools on our website very helpful. Her tip is to remove the stencils from the wall right away after the second coat as she found if the paint dried, the stencils would stick to the wall and end up peeling off some of the paint.

The Clarkes are interested in the effect space has on culture, atmosphere and on the attitudes of the people who use those spaces. They hope that this project will kick-start a culture of ownership and responsibility for the spaces in their church community and beyond.