Mat Board longevity or useful that has been in stock a long time.

[tombe]

Do you think the quality or usefulness of mats goes down if they have been in stock a long time. Hope I said that right. Most of the mats are museum, alphamat, or crescent rag mats, and some other conservation quality. Some have been in stock 5-7 years, others 8 -15, and others longer then that from the time companies did not have their own trucks. Have been in bins with coroplast partitions and bottoms, some with masonite partitions and bottoms, some in plastic bags, some in boxes, and some stacked along the wall (mostly 40x60). Most look ok but have been handled at times, some have dust, probably some spider webs on a few, some pieces, some bowed a little from storage. Not sure what else to say. A little leery about putting a pretty old mats on quality items. Any thoughts. Thanks.

 

[RoboFramer]

Seeing as it is recommended by some that mats are changed out every X years or so from a relatively encapsulated/enclosed environment ... a picture frame, I should imagine it does. There it is absorbing carp out of the atmosphere, unenclosed!

 

[wpfay]

My daughter is in the food service industry and I think her point about food applies. If you have doubt, you've answered your own question.
This doesn't mean the older boards can't be used, but not on the highest level of preservation.
There are ways to check the boards for contamination. UV light for mold growth, pH tester for acidity. visual inspection for cleanliness...

 

[Shayla]

Slightly warped boards can sometimes be flattened by heating a warm dry mount press.

 

[Prospero]

Being in the biz a while I have sometimes had the opportunity to examine matting I did quite a few years
ago. One was a w/c painting I did maybe 30+ years previously. Mat was good old 'cooking' grade. The bevels
had gone brown, which is par for the course, but otherwise nothing nasty. Painting hadn't suffered. Older mats,
prior to the '70s do deteriorate but from the mid-eighties onward the quality improved greatly.
I think it's slightly ironic that we should have to worry about boards going bad while in stock. They are going to
age when in the frame. I would expect them to 'last' quite a long time more than 15 years.

** I once tried to compost a lot of mat chevrons. They don't rot. In fact after about 5 years I could have dug
them up, brushed them down and returned them to the selector.

 

[tedh]

From experience, I pull old Crescents that are at least 15 years old, (including 1592 which I love), and they are still totally good.

They’ve been in a clean, dry, modern, commercial space, and I see no reason why they would deteriorate.

 

[David Hewitt]

Seeing as it is recommended by some that mats are changed out every X years or so from a relatively encapsulated/enclosed environment ... a picture frame, I should imagine it does. There it is absorbing carp out of the atmosphere, unenclosed!

Agree, we had a sticker on the framing package back saying. It is recommended that this artwork be inspected every 7 to10 years. This service is provided to you at no charge. But being inspected is what it means, there may be no issues of any kind.
If the framing is done with preservation practices and housed in a proper environment, it should last a very very long time.
So the case for mat storage, if stored in a proper environment, IMHO it should be just fine. Think other situations such as books, papers in archives---.

 

[Ylva]

I would not use them on anything valuable, but if they still cut well, I would still use them

 

[Prospero]

I still have bits of Crescent 'Silkis'. I used some quite recently. The cores were brown, but that is not altogether
bad as they blend in with the faux-fabric surface papers. As for the conservation aspect, the artwork paper had
gone very brown as well. So they can both fight it out.

 

[monkframe]

In the last year I had to move my workshop and downsize considerably. So I did an inventory of mat boards and found many discontinued colors, scraps, etc. I donated them to a non-profit connected to a large school district that sells art supplies, among other things. This was pre-pandemic, of course. I ended up with an accurate inventory, and mat boards that can be replaced from suppliers if I take an order requiring more than I have. And it takes up a lot less space.
If you've got boards from ten years ago, you'll probably have them ten years hence.

 

[framah]

If you've got boards from ten years ago, you'll probably have them ten years hence.

That pretty much sums it all up.

The food analogy only applies of you plan to eat them.

I would think that as long as they weren't sitting right against plywood or masonite, then they should still be good to use.

If you are over 55, then you can offer a life time guarantee... your lifetime!!

 

[Nikodeumus]

I've been working in this shop for 12 years.
The current owner bought the business at least 15 years or more ago.
I am still pulling out partial matboards from inventory that pre-date when he took over the business.
I inspect them very carefully if I want to use one in a design.
Most of them have been shuffled around so much they are too scuffed to be used for customer's work.
I mostly use them for test cuts, space filler, etc.

 

[RoboFramer]

Seeing as it is recommended by some that mats are changed out every X years or so from a relatively encapsulated/enclosed environment ... a picture frame, I should imagine it does. There it is absorbing carp out of the atmosphere, unenclosed!

This was slightly tongue-in-cheek. I get old stuff in which just takes a glance, no need to even open the frame, then stuff that when you do open the frame makes you go ARGGHH - but only because, unlike the stuff you didn't have to open, you know it was done recently enough for ignorance to not really be any excuse.

If it was my own stuff coming back, then if it was in my salad years I'd know it needed changing, all of it. But if it was from 5-10 years ago - or more really, how would I test it all? I have no gear to do that bar my eyeballs!