The Framers Forum

I have some square pieces of art (approx 20cm x 20cm) on heavy 400gsm card stock that are to be placed into square 25cm deep frames. I am trying to float the art from the backboard, so would like the art to be raised by 1cm.

I could purchase 1cm thick foamboard and cut a smaller square piece, say 15cm x 15cm, and glue this to the backboard then stick the art on top. However, buying 1cm thick foam board is very expensive as i'd have to use an A4 piece for each frame, making it roughly an additional £1.00 extra expense. I could cut very small pieces of 1cm foamboard and glue them randomly in different places to the backboard then apply the art over the top. Whilst this is a cheaper alternative, I don't know if I would get the art positioned completely flat. I find that some foamboard can compress or squash, whilst some can have the slightest bow or bend. I just don't think it would allow for a flat enough area for the art to be positioned on to.

Are there any other alternatives that are relatively cost effective to do, whereby I could get the art to be raised by 1cm?

Float the artwork onto mountboard slightly smaller than the artwork, then you can use a stack of small pieces of foamcore (or pretty much any stable material appropriate to the conservation level of the framing) to build up to the required height.

How solid and flat is your 400 gsm card stock? It might need a bigger support that just 15cm x 15cm. The 400 gsm card stock may distort over time. I would personally go bigger to be certain about this. Also 10mm foamboard may actually be a very labour efficient solution. Sure the foamboard is a significant cost, but if it saves you time there may be a balance to be struck here, between the cost of the labour time and the cost of the foambooard. I am not convinced that most other 10mm thick boards are going to be any cheaper.

Also building up layers of thinner materials may involve more time and more glue. 10mm thick foamboard sounds sensible to me!

I'd be inclined to slice up small pieces from lengths of wood spacers, such as these from Wessex: https://www.wessexpictures.com/A130.html That one is 7mm deep but there are other sizes.

If you can't meet the minimum order for Wessex, you can collect single items from any of their depots.

What Jim said. Conservation-wise, always hinges the work to a board and then glue the board to the undermount. This way if it's ever reframed, it's easy to reverse it (or if you make a mistake...).

Imo if you're going to use blocks that's fine but forget about "randomly", nothing in framing is random! Just think out what will work. Two top and bottom one in the middle etc. Is £1 extra per piece really going to break the bank? Serious question. Time-wise (which counts for a large % of the cost of framing), hinging straight to 10mm foamboard and then gluing and weighting onto the undermount is a lot more time efficient.

If you want wooden spacers at 10mm, i was literally about to chop these up for firewood. I had them on my chop saw when i remembered my coffee was going cold and had a look on here.
By chance they are 10mm. You can have them for postage if any good? I am having a quick clear up so chucking a load of timber before drowning in it.

Nick

Where spacers are not going to be seen, I sometimes will rip cut the spacers of off a scrap piece of plywood, using my table saw. I don't usually do it these days as I have lots of bits of scrap moulding I cut up instead. I have quite a good supply of 14mm thick pine moulding scraps which is very quick and easy to cut up in to 14mm deep spacers. Using the table saw is a bit wasteful as the 3mm thick blade turns 3mm of wood in to saw dust, with each cut, but as it is only left over scrap wood, I don't really mind very much. I like to slice up pieces of scrap flat moulding, where the thickness is already machined to the required depth and I can just stlce off however many spacers that I need. I quite often smooth down the cut faces on my bench top belt sander, a couple of quick coats of paint and it's job done.

Making spacers from moulding scraps generally works best when working in batches. I find this is quite an enjoyable and relaxing task and it greatly reduces my waste, which has to go in the dumpster. These days I only get my dumster emptied when it as completely full. I just phone them up and pay the charge over the phone and don't call them again until it is full again. This saves me quite a lot of money, this way! When it gets nearer to the winter, want to start selling bags of fire wood from my shop as well. I'd rather get paid for it, that have to pay for it to be taken away. 14mm deep spacers are not especially deep, but putting a double mount made from left over mountboard scraps looks nicer and increases the depth behind the glass to 17mm and therefore the deep box frame are more useful to customers and easier to sell at a bit better price as well.

I'm not so sure that I would want to go to the same amount of bother to add extra spacing behind tray mounted artworks. 10mm foamboard sound much more quick and easy to me, as long as it is a worthwhile quantity.

sorry for the delay in replying everyone. Many thanks for your feedback and ideas. I think I will go with just using 1cm foamcore. The issue I had was I often see a slight bend in foamboard but if cutting these into small squares then obviously it shouldn't be an issue.

My main issue would be cutting thick mountboard to mount under the 400gsm card. I used to use a guillotine to cut the card but have since found just using a metal ruler and stanley cuts the board with a cleaner finish and I have more control. I can't cut the mountboard using either due to thickness and I don't really want to invest in a mount cutter in case the idea I have doesn't take off. I have no issue further down the line if any sales come in.

Any ideas for cutting mount board or should I just go with a supplier to cut them up for me...just thinking overall costs here as I'm working on quite tight profit margins due to the picture frame i'm using taking a large chunk so any extras also cut into overall costs?