That expression “necessity is the mother of invention” has been proven to be true and this frame is proof of that for us. Recently Diane, decided to paint on a smaller format (12″x 12″) than she usually does and asked for a floater style frame. Reason was that she didn’t want any of her painting hidden beneath the sight edge. A floater style was the obvious choice but she asked if I could give it more of a presence so I added a collar and the frame was born! I posted it on social media and received many positive comments so decided to share the building of this frame.

I chose Basswood since I knew it was going to be painted and I have that in my shop. Haven’t priced it out yet but if your interested contact me. The retired woodshop teacher in me likes to share my work so that if you’d like, you could make your own — appreciate it though if you give me credit for the design. Peterman Lumber carries a rough, 5/4 Basswood that I can usually mill down to 1 1/8″ or so. I chose to resaw that and was able to get 1/2″ thick material for these frames which looked fine for a frame of this size. For a larger canvas it should probably be thicker but resawing saves money and reduces waste.

Basically the frame consists of two parts, the collar and the floater section. The collar pieces are 2 1/2″ wide, mitered, then biscuit slots are cut before gluing it up. I found that clamping the 4 pieces together made it easier to apply the glue to the ends and the #10 slot, they were too thin to stand on their own. Clamping was a little tricky because the pieces are so thin and the clamp wanted to tilt up and off.

For the floater piece I use a technique which is a bit more elaborate to make than the basic L-shape profile available commercially but I believe it’s more versatile and stronger. I cut a groove/dado in the side pieces to mount the canvas to, it also keys the pieces together. That dado allows me to position the canvas at any depth. I did a post on it some time ago, here’s a LINK that will explain my process in detail. After being clamped overnight the next step is to prepare to join them together, you may need to fine tune the corners either with a sharp block plane and/or sandpaper. With wood this thin it’s very easy for the mitered corners to get slightly misaligned.

To insure that the holes were centered exactly in the 1/2″ thickness I came up with a method that I like better than a pencil line. Set your marking gauge to 1/4″ and scribe the line. A scribed line helps you center your scratch awl better then a penciled line. This was followed by pre-drilling and countersinking the holes for the #6×3/4″ screws, I used my drill press to make sure they’re 90°. In the middle picture I carefully line the two sections together and only drilled pilot holes for two screws. These were then tightened and the remaining pilot holes were drilled into the back of the floater section. Hint: mark the location of the collar to the floater section before you remove it. The collar was removed and I started screws in each hole to save time, glue ups can be stressful! A thin bead of glue was applied to the inside edge of the floater. The collar was then carefully centered and held in place with those first two screws and then each screw was tightened down sequentially like you’d tighten the lug nuts when changing your tire.

For the finish on these I decided spray paint would be the easiest. I imagined fighting runs on the vertical corners of the floater section and then the paint building up on the “collar” if I’d attempted to brush on the finish. My usual process is to seal the entire frame with a coat of Zinsser seal shellac which is wax free. Rustoleum, satin black is the final coat. After it had cured for 2-3 days I used craft paper to knock down the nibs from the spray. I used to use paper bags in the past but they’re not so easy to find these days! I prefer to apply a thin coat of Liberon paste wax with cotton balls as the final step.

Here are some pictures of the final project with paintings by my wife, Diane Eugster. It is a series she painted after visiting a rehearsal at the local ballet company. The titles are “The In Between” and “Take it From the Top”. Here are images of the final results: