When it comes to framing art on canvas, there are a lot of question marks. Does the canvas need to be stretched, or restretched? What is a strainer bar? Does this canvas have enough room for a gallery wrap if I stretch it? Should the canvas be floated, or framed traditionally? Do canvas pieces get framed with glass? What happens if my canvas doesn’t have enough fabric to be stretched? Is my piece too big for a frame at all? What happens if the artwork on the canvas isn’t square? Don’t worry, we’ve seen it all since we opened our doors in 2010 and we are here to help create a frame package for your piece that is both appropriate in presentation and preserved for decades to come. Let’s review some terminology to get you comfortable with the processes and tools we will use for your artwork that we will go over with you during your design consultation.
Stretched Canvas: Canvas fabric that is pulled tightly over a wooden frame, known as a stretcher bar, and secured in place resulting in a taut, rigid surface ready for painting.
Unstretched Canvas: Rolled or loose canvas fabric that has not been mounted onto wooden stretcher bars. Canvas pieces that have been purchased and shipped traditionally arrive this way to the buyer. To learn more about buying and shipping canvas, visit here.
Strainer Bar: A fixed, rigid wooden frame used by artists to stretch and mount canvas for painting. Unlike stretcher bars, which have expandable joints to adjust tension, strainer bars have fixed corners and are strictly used to provide a stable, unchanging support structure.
Stretcher Bar: Wood used to construct a sturdy, four-sided frame that holds an artist’s canvas taut. Stretcher bars have keyed corners to adjust tension, and are not fixed corners.
Stacked Frames: A custom framing technique where two or more individual frame mouldings are layered and joined together to form a single, cohesive frame.
Float Frames: Picture frames designed so that a stretched canvas appears to be suspended in mid-air within the molding. Also used for other mediums, like board pieces.
Board Mount: Process of permanently bonding art on canvas to a rigid, conservation grade foam core using a heat activated or pressure sensitive adhesive film. It flattens the canvas, removes wrinkles, and eliminates the need for traditional stretching over wooden bars. While this is a great option for pieces that do not have enough fabric to be traditionally stretched or the piece is too unstable for stretching, this is a permanent and non-reversible process so we do not recommend this option for high value pieces.
Liner: An inner frame made of wood wrapped in linen fabric that sits between the artwork and the main outer frame. Liners can also be used on non-canvas pieces that are too big for a mat to accomplish division between the piece and the frame.
Giclée: A high-resolution, archival quality, digital reproduction of an original artwork created using advanced inkjet printing on canvas or high quality archival paper.
Gallery Wrap: A method of stretching canvas over a thick, wooden frame so that the artwork extends around the sides and is stapled to the back of the strainer bar.
