Framing and hanging a royal pet portrait: frames, glass, walls and light

A royal portrait of your dog or cat is made to be looked at every day. Once the print arrives, three questions decide how it looks and how long its colours last: what frame holds it, where it hangs, and what light falls on it. This guide walks through each step in order, from the parts of a frame to the nail in the wall, and links to a deeper page on every step. Most of the advice comes from the Canadian Conservation Institute, the Government of Canada's conservation institute in Ottawa, which publishes care guides for museums and collectors. The same rules that protect a museum print protect yours.

Why framing matters for a pet portrait

A Purrealism art print is printed on paper, in a matte or glossy finish. The guide to art prints and paper explains how a print is made and how to store it before it is framed. Paper and the colours on it react to light, damp air, heat and touch. A frame puts a barrier between the print and all four.

The Canadian Conservation Institute gives three reasons to frame any work of art: to protect it, to display it more easily, and to enhance its appearance. All three apply to a pet portrait. The glazing (the sheet of glass or clear plastic at the front) keeps fingers, dust and cooking fumes off the print. The frame gives you a firm edge to hold and a place to fix hanging hardware. The colour and shape of the frame also change how the costume and the background of the portrait look.

Framing also protects the print from people. A portrait of the family dog tends to hang where the family spends time: the living room, the hallway, the stairs. Those are the places where a shoulder, a bag or a wagging tail can touch the wall.

A short history of frames and hanging

The frame on your wall has a long history. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London dates separate wooden picture frames in Italy to the 15th century. The museum says they grew out of earlier metal and wooden frames on church altarpieces, and were used to protect and enhance both religious and non-religious paintings. The National Gallery in London puts it this way: frames have been designed as removable items that enhance a painting only since the early 1500s.

Some of those early frames were covered in gold. A carved frame from Venice, made between 1550 and 1600 and now in the V&A, is carved from lime or poplar wood and water gilded. That means thin gold leaf laid over a coloured layer called bole, on top of a thin white ground. The same record says that the frame's pierced carving once let the colour of the wall show through it, and that the frame was later damaged by damp, with water marks and mould on the back. Even a museum frame suffers when it hangs somewhere wet.

The way pictures were hung has changed as well. In 1787 the Royal Academy's summer exhibition in London filled the Great Room at Somerset House with paintings. The Government Art Collection calls the print of that exhibition, engraved by Pietro Antonio Martini after a drawing by Johann Heinrich Ramberg, an important record of how the exhibitions were presented. In the V&A's copy of the print, frames cover the walls edge to edge, from just above the visitors' heads to the ceiling, and the top rows lean forward. Small dogs run about on the floor among the crowd. Today most homes hang fewer pictures, lower, with space between them. The page on planning a gallery wall around a pet portrait shows how to group several frames without the crowding of 1787.

The parts of a framed print

A framed print is a stack of layers. From front to back:

The inner lip of the frame is called the rabbet (you will also see it spelled rebate). The Canadian Conservation Institute says it should be deep enough for a mat, a backing board and a glazing material, which come to 2 cm in total (the Institute's rounded figure). It also warns that metal clip-together frames are not always deep enough for all three. The page on how to measure a frame explains the rabbet, the sight size and the outside size, so you can check a frame before you buy it.

Frame, mat and glazing

The frame is the part people notice first. The page on choosing a frame for a royal pet portrait matches frame colours and widths to the portrait styles, such as a gold frame beside the gold throne of the Maharaja portrait.

The mat is the card border between the frame and the print. The Institute explains that, inside a frame, a window mat creates an air space that keeps the image from touching the glazing. The page on mats for framed prints covers mat colours, borders and the materials that will not stain the paper.

The glazing is glass or acrylic. The Institute lists the trade-offs: glass is heavier and breaks more easily, while acrylic is lighter but scratches more easily and bows in large sizes. The page on glass or acrylic for a framed print compares them and explains what ultraviolet filtering can and cannot do.

Light, damp and heat: the three slow risks

Most damage to a framed print is slow. It happens over months and years, so you do not see it until it is done.

Light. The Canadian Conservation Institute says visible light fades colours, ultraviolet (UV) light yellows and weakens materials, and infrared heats them. It defines the light dose as the light level in lux multiplied by the hours of exposure. A print under a dim light for a long time can fade as much as a print under a bright light for a short time. The Institute also says there is no true recovery possible from faded colours. The Library of Congress makes a related point about glazing: filtering out ultraviolet removes the most damaging part of sunlight, and all light, visible light included, damages paper.

Damp. High humidity lets mould grow on paper, and the V&A frame from Venice shows what damp does to a frame. The Institute advises against hanging art on the inside of an exterior wall in winter, because that surface gets cold and water can condense behind the frame.

Heat. Radiators, air vents, fireplaces and hot lamps all dry and stress a picture. The Institute lists areas near heat radiators, air vents or fireplaces as poor places to display paintings.

Two pages cover these risks in detail: how to light a framed portrait at home deals with lamps and bulbs, and where not to hang a print deals with sunlight, damp rooms and heat sources.

The order to work in

It helps to make decisions in this order, because each one limits the next.

1. Choose the wall. Pick a dry interior wall that direct sun does not reach. The wall sets the largest print that fits and the light the portrait will get.
2. Choose the print size. Purrealism prints come in four sizes: 8 × 10, 12 × 16, 18 × 24 and 24 × 36 inches. The Purrspectives article how big is an 8 × 10 print gives all four in centimetres and shows which mat and frame sizes fit each one.
3. Choose the frame and mat. The mat border and the frame width add to the print size. A 12 × 16 inch print with a 3 inch mat and a 1 inch frame covers 20 × 24 inches of wall.
4. Choose the glazing. Weigh glare, weight and cost. Large frames are heavy with glass.
5. Choose the hardware. Match it to the frame's weight and to what the wall is made of.
6. Mark the height and hang it. Work out the nail position from the centre height you want.
7. Set the light. Aim lamps so they light the portrait without a reflection in the glass.

The hanging planner further down this page helps with step 6. You pick one of the four print sizes, its orientation and the frame and mat border, then enter the centre height, the wire drop and your furniture's width and height. It shows the nail height (the centre height, plus half the frame height, minus the wire drop), the gap above the furniture and the frame's width as a percentage of the furniture's width, with a drawing to scale.

Hanging it on the wall

Two questions come up every time a frame goes on a wall: how high, and on what. The hardware needs care. The Canadian Conservation Institute's guide to caring for paintings says works of art frequently fall off walls because hanging hardware fails or was badly installed, and that lighter works are often the victims, because less attention is paid to what they need.

For height, measure to the centre of the frame and work from there. The page on how high to hang a portrait gives a method for choosing the centre height, using the Smithsonian's guidelines for exhibitions that people view both standing and seated, and a formula that turns the centre height into a nail position.

For hardware, the Canadian Conservation Institute describes D-rings (flat metal rings screwed to the back of the frame) and advises hanging a frame from two points on the wall, which makes it easier to level and keeps it from falling if one hanger comes loose. Walls differ: the Institute says a plywood wall holds a nailed hook without an anchor, while drywall, plaster, brick and concrete need drilled holes with wall plugs or anchors. The page on picture hanging hardware for drywall, plaster and brick goes through each wall type.

Common mistakes

These are the mistakes the conservation guides warn about most often.

• Hanging in direct sun. The Canadian Conservation Institute puts direct noon sunlight at almost 100,000 lux, against 50 lux for sensitive works on paper in a museum.
• Letting the print touch the glass. The Institute says a framed work should not touch the glazing, to avoid image transfer, staining or mould. A mat or spacers keep them apart.
• Taping the print to the mat with household tape. The Institute says gummed and pressure-sensitive tapes from the shop age badly and will, in time, stain and damage the paper. Paper hinges hold a print safely.
• A light fixed to the frame. The Institute advises against attaching light fixtures to frames, because they create a hot spot and add to fading.
• One hook and a worn wire. Wire can fray. Two hooks and a checked wire, or two D-rings on two hooks, are safer.
• Spraying cleaner on the glazing. The Library of Congress says to put the cleaning agent on the cloth instead of on the glazing. The Canadian Conservation Institute gives the reason: this stops liquid from staining the mat or the artwork.
• A frame where people brush past. The Institute advises against narrow corridors and stairwells where a picture can be touched or bumped.

Framed print, unframed print or a screen

Here is how the main ways to show a portrait compare. Each suits a different room and a different reader.

The Institute's guide on glazing says that plastic is lightweight, which makes it a common choice for large works, and that glass is heavier and needs sturdy frames and hanging systems. For a 24 × 36 inch print, that difference in weight is worth weighing before you choose.

The digital pack is a high-resolution download, and a screen shows it without exposing any paper to light. The page on showing a digital pet portrait on a screen covers phones, televisions and digital frames, and how to keep the file safe.

How this applies when you choose a portrait

Framing choices start before you order. Three decisions in the portrait studio affect the frame and the wall.

The size. Hold a sheet of paper cut to the print size, plus the mat and frame you plan, against the wall. A small 8 × 10 inch portrait suits a desk or a shelf. A 24 × 36 inch print needs a wide wall and strong hardware. The pricing page lists the four sizes side by side.

The finish. Matte and glossy paper react differently to light in the room. Behind glazing, the glazing adds its own reflection, so the room's light matters for both finishes. If the portrait faces a window, plan the glazing and the lamp angles with care.

The style. A portrait with a strong gold colour, such as the Maharaja with his gold throne, sits well in a gold or warm wood frame. A portrait with steel armour against a sunset sky, such as the Rajput Warrior, suits dark wood or bronze. Browse the gallery to see the finished portraits and their colours, and the Purrspectives article on how to choose a royal portrait style for your pet for help with the style itself.

If you have questions about sizes or finishes, the questions and answers page covers the portrait studio and the two editions.