National Geographic MapsNational Geographic World Wall Map - Executive (Mural: 116.25 x 77 in) (National Geographic Reference Map)

We put this map on my boyfriends office wall a month ago. It looks absolutely beautiful. It's already been a great conversation piece when he has client meetings. The colors are true to what you see on Amazon. Everything matched up well and the seams are barely noticable. The print quality is very nice and the paper is fairly heavy.It's a bit nerve racking putting it up. I have some experience with wallpaper application and that helped. The instructions say to size the wall and use clay based paste. I really wanted to use regular paste but stuck with what they said, I figured they had a reason. The clay paste is very tacky and gives excellent stick and is very low moisture so the panels don't swell and then shrink when it drys. Also you don't get paste all over the front of the panel.Here's the downside to working with clay paste. It's VERY dry. You can thin it a little with water, but it doesn't seem to help to keep the paste wet any longer. There is NO, and I mean NO slip for shifting the paper and matching things up. You NEED two people for this job and a lot of patience. You also need to have all your tools ready before you put your paste on the panel. Do it last and be quick about it, throughly coating it. Get it to the wall quickly, it starts drying out fast.This is my BIG TIP... wish I had thought of it on the first panel. Even though you've sized the wall and you've let it dry... just before you put a panel up, roll on a very light coat of sizing. It wont give you slip, but it will keep the paste wet longer giving you more time to match things up. It made a "world" : ) of difference on our last panel.We looked for information and how to on using clay based paste and didn't find anything. I hope this tip helps someone out!

We are in love with this map for our little explorers nursery! It’s colorful and looks amazing! We used paste and sanded down the wall to make it as flat as possible before adding primer/sealer then let dry for 2 days. Use a thick coat of wall paper adhesive to allow for it so slide a little. We started with the middle panel, then the two extra pieces had about 1/2” overlay. I recommend 3 people for installation. We were able to line up the map perfectly but needed all 6 hands to do so. We did not have to do any cutting and got it on the first try however we had grandma’s help who’s a wallpaper pro and she said it was very tough and harder than normal wallpaper but together we nailed it! Highly recommend!!!

This is the second time we have purchased this map, wallpapered it with wallpaper glue (from Laura Ashley), and built a chair rail frame around it painted an elegant dark brown. I am a Geography teacher and use it to teach my little ones to identify the continents and oceans... and sometimes, teasingly ask, "How many countries end with '-tan'?" It's a fabulous and becoming backdrop for an adventure or transportation themed boys' room. This mural comes in three large pieces. When it hangs heavy with wallpaper glue, it will stretch, so the faster you can get it onto the wall, the better the city/country names will line up. My previous map aligned better than this one (also from Nat Geog). This one matches at the top but not so much at the bottom... so if you are hanging it really high up, then align it from the bottom where you will see errors more clearly. When the wallpaper glue dried, the bubbles disappeared, so don't be tempted to prick them with a pin when it's wet. This particular mural has a more elegant coloring than our previous sepia one which had more reddish brown hues. TAKE NOTE that the dimensions given are misleading because they are the sum total of the three sheets, but when you overlap them so that the geo-political lines and country names correctly align, the total width (left to right) is less, so don't DRAW guiding lines on your wall based on the given dimensions because you'd have to paint over them (like us).

This is a fairly nice quality map, it is quite large. Don't listen to the other reviewers, You do not need to get this professionally installed. Think of it as three large posters which slightly overlap each other. The way I mounted this on the wall was quite simple first I lined up the three posters on the floor and used some double-sided tape to align them. Then I hung the entire poster on the wall using two nails at the top left and right had a corners and painters tape along the edges which worked very well. Then I constructed a frame around the map using door casing/wood trim which was actually quite simple to do and overall finish looks quite nice, I will upload a picture to show off the final product. I did not feel the need to put glue or wallpaper paste on the wall and the way I did it looks pretty good without damaging the wall. The map really does look much better with a wooden trim frame around it.In terms of the map content I felt like there could have been more detail given the size of the map. In addition the overall text was sharp however some of the graphics appeared to be somewhat pixelated, not a huge deal but I did notice that, given the price of the map I felt like there should not have been the case. Overall I would say recommended, and please feel free to ask me any questions and refer to the picture.