Crescent Select Mats

[crobertsgallery]

OK I have the crescent rag mats which are 100% rag with color on top of the white core. Are Select mats the same as alaphamat in Bainbridge line because they are alaphacellulose?? And The select colors are so similar to the museum rag mats with a larger range of contemporary shades and colors. Just how many mat samples are necessary when considering storage and organization of all of the different boards? What is every ones logic regarding all of the boards? Do you carry them all? Do you offer them all? When do you go with the select? Just because of color? What about complete conservation?

 

[Ron Eggers]

For Crescent, and for many of their customers, the Select mats were in response to a price-point issue with L-J's Artique line. They are cheaper than Crescent Rag and they are a c/p board. I also think Crescent is recognizing an increasing awareness of c/p framing. I'd be surprised to see any new additions to the decorative Crescent lines.

I am in the process of incorporating some of the Select mats into my sample rack and inventory. Some of the colors are unique. There are a handful of Artique mats that I stock for the same reason. It's a minor pain, since you can only get Artique from L-J and L-J is not going to carry the Select mats. I prefer one-stop shopping.

I like the Accent mats, which are rag, and also some of the Michael Graves mats.

I personally have no reservations about using a purified wood pulp board, like Select, for c/p applications but, all other things being equal, I'd use one with Zeolites. That would be Alphamat Artcare.

 

[Ron Eggers]

I'm just about done wading through all the Select mats. It appears a small handful of them are unique colors, and I'll add those to the sample rack. I'll cross-reference the ones that are duplicates of the Crescent Rag mats so that I can use them if I'm price-bidding on a job.

I bevel-cut all the samples, as is my habit, and didn't have any problems with ragged cuts, even though I didn't change the blade as often as I normally would while cutting mats. It seems to cut just like my other premium boards.

The big question in my mind, and maybe in yours, is this: If the purified wood pulp boards, like the Crescent Select, are as c/p as the rag boards (and I believe they are,) why not use them instead of the rag boards and either improve the bottom line or offer a more competitive price?

I think Crescent would tell us that it's a good/better/best (decorative/Select/rag) scenario, but I don't believe that. My view looks more like "meets FACTS standards" or "doesn't meet FACTS standards."

 

[Bogframe]

I love the select colors, especially some of the grays, but none of my distributors have the full line yet, and it's frustrating not knowing which ones are in stock and which ones aren't.