how to frame 4x6 rug wall hanging

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theframer

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I have a customer that needs to have a 4x6 rug wall hanging framed. I recently attended the Orlando Buyers Caravan. One attendee suggested that I put it on 4x6 strecher bars, edge the rug with canvas & attach. The customer is open to suggestions & will consider whatever treatment suggestions. I have been in the picture framing business about 4 years & have never tackled anything like this. Any help would be appreciated. theframer, rcase@mpinet.net
 
Not knowing the weight of the rug,I will just presume that it is a throw rug I just framed a 54x54 inch rug from the middle east. I sewed the rug to two over size mats that had to be pieced together. Then attached the mats to two sheets of foamcore with the seams going the opposite way as the mats seam. The fun then began two hours of sewing the rug through the mats and also the foamcore. Sew all the sides every 6 inches and in the middle of the rugs were ever is needed. I then finished with plexi for glazing( Not that it's great to work with but because of size did not have much choice)and a frame that my customer choose. I held the glazing off the rug by building walls inside the rabbit with foamcore and mats.I hope this helps with the problem
 
And speaking of lining shadow boxes: if you find you must use the decorative matboard which matches your substrate, try drymounting a six or seven inch wide piece of the mat to Bainbridge's new Speedmount heat-activated foamcore, making it also long enough to fit the box. I find the Speedmount to compress quite nicely under a little more pressure than usual. Then cut one side with a straight cut, and the side touching the substrate with a reverse bevel. The sandwiched mat/foamcore strip is thick enough to hold the glass and thin enough to hide under the lip. This trick works well when you're using paper/rag boards instead of the thicker suedes.
 
For lining the insides try drymounting a piece of surface paper (suede, linen, paper etc) from any matboard to foamboard. Make the surface paper larger than the foam and wrap it around the foamboard. Then glue the foamboard to the inside of the shadowbox. It will be thick enough to hold the glass and compressed enough not to show. If it does show it will match the inside color.

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Timberwoman
AL
I cut the mat, I pet the =^..^= cat.
 
One problem I've had with these oversized pieces is keeping the plexi from sagging out of the frame, especially narrow frames. Now I try to sell a fillet on the inside of the frame to allow a little extra room for the plexi to expand and contract. Wider mouldings I'll run through a table saw to get a 1/2" wide rabbet. Fabric wrapped mats (or in this case mountboard) look great on these pieces and allow you to use a nice matching vertical scoop liner on the inside of the frame. Good luck!
 
I framed a hooked rug my grandmother hooked for me the size is about 24 x 36. What I did was, drymount foamboard and a sheet of matboard together. The color of the matboard was a color in the rug. The size of the matboard/foamboard was about 2.5" bigger then the rug.Then every 1/2" I used stainless steel stick pins to go into the rug and through the mattboard/foamboard which holds the rug in place. I put some in the middle aswell. The excess part of the pins I cut off. I then took a black marker and colored the heads of the pins so they don't stand out. I used a 1/2' plastic spacer to keep the glass off the rug. Looks really good and protects it.
 
We have found that using window screen over bars works best for us. We lay the rug out on the screen and sew (no problem with keeping it streight either because of the screen web)and then we stretch it on the bars. This keeps you from working on 4 x 6 or larger bars. When we finish we install "Z" bar and the rug hangs flat on the wall.
The other advantage is that when you are done the rug if free to breath and the project is much lighter to handle.
 
on mounting fabrics, especialy heavy ones i have stitched a 1 1/2" to 2" Width of velcro loop along the length of the top edge of piece. then mounted the hook velcro to what ever panel or board it will be displayed on. this alowes the fabric to hang from the full length of the top edge and willbe able to expand and contract freely.
 
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