Military Wall Art

Military wall art covers two different errands. One is honouring somebody still serving or recently out. The other is remembering a war, a unit, or a person who is gone. The pieces here do both, and they are not interchangeable — it is worth knowing which one you are buying for.

What We Carry

Service poems and prayers for soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines, including pieces written for the family rather than the servicemember. Historical prints from the Second World War and earlier — aircraft, ships, the photographs and documents that fixed those years in memory. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Patriotic pieces for a hallway or an entryway.

Who They Are Bought For

Boot camp and basic training graduation, deployment and homecoming, retirement after twenty years, and Veterans Day. A good many are bought by parents and spouses rather than by the servicemember, and a fair number by grown children marking a father's or grandfather's service after he has died. That last group tends to want the historical prints rather than the poems.

Where They Go

An office, a den, a hallway, a shadow-box wall beside the medals and the folded flag. The larger canvas sizes carry a wall on their own; the smaller framed sizes have a fold-out easel back as well as a hanger, so they sit on a desk or a shelf.

Sizes, Frames And Canvas

Four frame colors — Barnwood, Charcoal, Black, and Walnut — in several sizes, plus ready-to-hang canvas in gallery-wrapped and floating-frame versions. Everything is printed and finished to order in our family-owned shop here in the USA, which is not a small thing on this particular shelf.

A Note On Getting It Right

Branch matters more than people outside the family expect, and so does the difference between someone who served and someone still serving. A piece addressed to a soldier will not sit well with a marine, and a retirement print given to somebody mid-career reads as a hint. When you are unsure, the pieces written for the FAMILY of a servicemember are the safer ground — they sidestep branch and rank entirely, and they say something the servicemember-facing designs cannot.

For a piece marking somebody who has died, the historical prints and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier tend to be received better than a service prayer. A prayer for safe return is written in the present tense, and that lands wrong afterwards.