When you decide to have your picture framed you will feel overwhelmed more than likely with so much choice in frames available, let alone then another choice on colour of mountboard after that.

If you are in a gallery which has a framing service as well as a showroom there could be even more confusion as the range will be even more extensive. If when you look around at the pictures for sale and you feel they are really complemented by the frames then you can have faith in the advice which you are given on your artwork. The assistant can visualize the final framing where perhaps you cannot; after all they see all the framing jobs as they come from the workshop.

1) Unless your artwork is of little value my advice would be don’t go for a clipframe which is the cheapest method of getting your picture on the wall (other than blue-tack, drawing pins or sellotape of course!) They are not airtight and can let damp, humidity and even small insects in between the layers. I have many times seen the actual top layer of paper nibbled almost bare by hungry bugs or by mould. If on the other hand you want something temporary on your walls in student digs or such for a limited time then fine, needs must.

2)Remember that you will not always live where you do now so don’t say ‘everything in my room is black or my walls are yellow, so I can’t have such or such a colour’. If yellow enhances you picture and looks just perfect, it makes sense to go with the picture not the colour of the walls. Odds are that one day when you move you will regret allowing sameness and matching be your criteria.

3)Have an open mind and take an interest in what is being suggested and shown to you. You are not beholden to go along with anything but some pictures can be made exciting in ways you probably would never have thought of yourself. I have put 4″ wide mouldings on postcards with no mount right to the image and they have ended up a decorator’s ‘dream piece’.

4)You will make life much easier for yourself if you resist taking in a frame from years ago which you would like to match. Fashions change in framing as does everything else.
If you want a matching pair choose a complementry frame and reframe the old one to match. Metallic extrusion aluminium was very popular once but not now. Thinner the better was ‘in’ once but likewise not now.

5)Have in your mind ‘where and what with’ you intend to hang your picture. Today they are clumped together in a focal point and not spaced evenly around the room at eye-level. Paint a nice big square on the wall in a vibrant colour and frame your work to hang within it. I like silver frames on navy blue and black on terracotta for instance.

Footnote: If whilst you are at the framer’s you were to hear another customer say “I’ll just leave this framing job with you, can’t hang about – just ring me when they’re ready and they cost what they cost” then you know you are in good hands as that is a repeat customer for sure just going out the door!