Friday, June 1, 2012

Playing With Frames

I've been doing some painting lately but really have nothing to show at this point.  I've also been playing around with making my own frames and the frame shown here is an example.

I've mentioned before that I'd like to get away from having to mat and frame my work under glass as having art framed is so expensive.  Even frames by themselves without glass are also expensive so I decided to try to build my own.  The frame on the left was a relatively simple design but dressed up with the addition of a little decorative moulding.  I don't have a lot of fancy woodworking equipment so the frame was made using a simple hand saw and a miter box.

The trick was to get all the sides even with the miters cut so there would be a perfect fit.  That's not at all easy with a hand saw and I did end up cutting more than one of some of the pieces before getting that perfect fit.  I even measured more than twice before cutting!

Anyway, I don't think I'll go into the framing business - at least without investing in a good miter saw, but I did have fun making a couple of frames!

2 comments:

Sue Clinker said...

Excellent work Jan - I'd love to be able to cut/make my own frames but it wouldn't be cost effective for me as i don't have storage space to hold enough stock/equipment.

For that reason I stopped cutting my own mounts/mats as I don't have dry storage space for large sheets of mountboard

Perhaps you'll get a good mitre saw in your Christmas Stocking LOL

Jan said...

Thanks, Sue. I was proud of being able to match the corners/miters so well just using hand tools. But, I'm not so sure I'd want to do this on a regular basis as, like you, I really don't have the room for any power tools like a miter saw. My DH built us a sort of woodworking area in the barn but then promptly filled it with junk to the point one can hardly get in there!

I think I'll stick with building the odd frame from time to time but no big production line of them!