Things to know about picture framing

Glazing

Condensation is bad for artwork. It can soften photographic emulsions, causing them to the glass and paper which can discolor or fall victim to brown spots. The solution? Either a mat or spacers which fit under the top of the frame and space the artwork or photo from the glass.

Fading

While almost all types of light can fade a picture, the worst is ultraviolet light. We have UV-filtering glass and acrylic. The UV-filtering blocks over 97% of the ultra-violet portion of the light spectrum, which is most responsible for fading.

Glass

Glass is available in regular clear, non glare (etched on one side to reduce reflection), UV-filtering clear and UV-filtering non glare.

Acrylic

Acrylic has the advantage of being half the weight of glass and is less breakable, but is harder to clean. Using a soft cotton cloth, not paper towels, will do the trick. Acrylic is available in clear or non glare as well.

Matting

Our picture mats are conservation boards (acid free) and are fade resistant because they are colored with pigments of color instead of dye's. Backing materials, most commonly foam core boards are also available in either regular or acid free configurations.

Mounting

Paper fibers tend to expand and contract with temperature and humidity changes , which results in buckling or waving of a picture or artwork. The only way to gaurantee that your artwork that your artwork will remain flat year round is to have it mounted. This involves coating the back of the picture or artwork with our adhesive and permanently adhering it to the backing material. However, since this process is not reversible, it is not recomended with valuable art or something that you may want to frame differently in the future. In this case, you would have the artwork "hinged", using acid free tape or photo corners. This would be the conservative process.