The Framers Forum

Good morning to the most helpful forum.

I hope you’re all doing well. I’ve been asked to frame an old family crest. It’s fairly old and the paper has started to disintegrate slightly.

I’ve looked at the hinge mounting method. I’ve also searched the forum and keep seeing people talk about the hedgehog method but I can’t find a tutorial on it.

Any suggestions welcome
Thanks in advance
Zac

The simplest (and in this instance my preferred method) would be to cut the window mount to cover the ragged edges, probably a double mount with a dark blue to match the crest under an off white (personal taste). This would be a traditional 'Book mount' with the artwork hinged with T hinges.

It is trendy at the moment to 'float mount' almost everything thus showing the edges - but IMHO in this instance you would be just emphasising the fact that the artwork is damaged, and actually detract from the artwork itself.

I would be reluctant to use any adhesive on it as the paper has probably deteriorated to the point where
the hinges will lift a layer of paper.
Using Mylar edge strips or complete encapsulation would be preferable.

Brilliant,

Thanks for the responses. Mark that was the route I was planning to go, I’ve even cut the smaller mount ready.

Reassuring to know I’m thinking along the right lines.

Prosperous - I’m going to check those Mylar edge strips out- Thanks

All the best Zac

The concern amount hinging it with adhesive on the hinges for me, would be the reversibility issue. The family crest is already showing some damage and if it latter was to requite any restoration work to be carried out on this peice, there is every possibility that the hinges would need to be soaked off, which is not a particular helpful move on something, which is already in not the best of condition. There are two possible mounting methods, but I think that which method is preferred might depend up on a careful assessment of the condition, before making the final decision. Proserro's suggested method is one, but it may be possible to implement this with narrow folded paper edge strips instead of the mylar and hide the narrow folded paper edge strips behind a mount.

Also I might be a possiblity to platform mount it behind a mount and sink the platform in to a recess in a secondary piece of mountboard behind the mount, only using the platform piece to hold the creast in position, with the platform piece being taped in to place with some suitable tape only at the rear and avoiding any contact of the tape with the creast. There's nothing technically wrong about encapsulation the item with mylar, for for myself i would want to avoid allowing the glossy surface of the mylar from being visible, if this was possible and this would avoid the item being displayed, in anything other than it's natural visual presentation. By all means encapsulate it with mylar, if this is your preferred method, as this is a legitimate conservation method, by if you are using conservation quality materials, the other methods are conservation quality methods as well.

I would make a duplicate digital copy for display purposes (with and or without the damage noted) and properly store the original document.

That makes some pretty good sense. It's simple and fairly foolproof, it's probably the quickest method and it's quite easy as well and it probably won't be too difficult to persuade the customer to go for it. It definitely ticks all my usual boxes for quick, simple and easy. So another interesting solution.

Good shout Jfeig,

I’m going to offer that option

Best Regards
Zac

It's probably a very helpful solution for you at this stage, when considering the learning curve to use some of the other solutions. Sometimes it's nice to have a convenient method, which neatly side steps some of the less easy procedures which you have not had time to learn just yet.

Count me among the advocates of framing a high quality digital reproduction with ordinary methods and materials. Then, place the original in safe storage, such as in a sealed box made for archival storage, kept is a clean, dark, climate controlled environment.

I would not recommend hinges for exactly the reasons given by others above - the paper is too fragile to offer secure support at tiny hinge points and future hinge removal would be unnecessarily challenging.

A direct Contact Overlay (DCO) mount using clear film (Mylar) encapsulation would provide good overall support without direct bonding, but as noted above, the glossy surface could be objectionable. Other DCO options would be a fine-mesh fabric overlay of Crepeline (silk) or Stabiltex (polyester), and also an acrylic DCO, which could show the edges in an almost-invisible mount. All of the DCO alternatives would provide secure, overall support for the fragile paper.

A Platform mount would work, as well, if you don't mind covering the edges by at least 1/4" (6.35 mm). This alternative has the added benefit of making a conveniently removable mount, in case the owner would want to take it out for reproduction later. Platform mounts, by the way, are perfect for ready-made document frames to be opened/reclosed for consumers to mount their own documents.

A Platform mount would work, as well, i ... documents.

Thanks Jim,

That's a really great idea and something I am considering trying out in my shop. I don't know if you have noticed it, but I like to offer my customers nice ideas that they can't usually find elsewhere, so this could be just right for me to make a few for displaying in one of my shop windows. Finding ideas that are different and not quite "run of the mill", tends to be largely how my business survives. I think that is a stroke of real genius!

I would get a high quality copy and frame that to at least conservation standards.
The original I would store away between two museum boards (level 1 board) in a dark environmental safe place.

The hedgehog method would not really be suitable for this is said before the paper does not look strong enough.
However, the tutorial is available on Lion's website, framing art on heavy paper or similar..
https://www.lionpic.co.uk/content/infos ... y-2019.pdf

I offered all the the suggestions to the customer and noted that it may be damaged if he wanted to reframe the original.

He said he didn’t want to reframe it in the future and really wanted to see the weathered edges so I did a float mount with two T-hinges.

Will post the final results once it’s in the frame

Thanks for all your help

I can't picture float mounting with two t hinges. Id be interested to see that.

I'm a very strong believer in educating the customer as to the options and costs involved, selling the benefits of conservation, and then letting them have the choice.

It's easy when you get into reading a forum like this, to start to believe that it is necessary to force customers 'to do the right thing'. Often conservation is not their priority, and they simply don't want to spend the money. When this is the case, I take the approach of doing the best I can within the customer's budget, and move on.

Yes, I agree. I always allow the customer to decide as well.

I don't know about the origins of this document but often these family crests are produced by companies that market such items and are therefore available for reprints. The accuracy of the contents of the documents may be questionable (as far as genealogy and heraldry is concerned) but this is not the place for that debate.

I agree, and have to admit that’s what I assumed it to be when I first saw the picture. It used to be a big thing on craft markets, you told them your surname and they printed out the document.

All done,

On reflection I would have chosen a bigger frame to give the crest some more breathing room but I was working within the constraints of a small budget so I’m fairly happy with the results. The customer was also pleased

Again thanks for your advice.

I’m tackling the A0 3D map today. I’ve built a skeleton frame to mount it onto (to stop it sagging over time) I’m then going to pop it into a deep rebate frame with spacers and no glass.

Many Thanks
Zac