Resource library

Every source this manual relies on, grouped by what it covers, with who publishes it and what it is good for. All of them are free to read.

Every link here was fetched and read on 2026-11-03. The next check is due 2027-11-03, when the product tables, the maker figures and the benefit and standards citations are checked again. Nothing on this page carries a referral or tracking parameter, and nothing on it is a paid product or an affiliate link. Where a source is named in a chapter by its kind rather than its name, this page is where you find out which body it was.

Inside the frame: board, mounting and materials

• Matting and framing for works on paper and photographs, Northeast Document Conservation Center, leaflet 4.10, written 2019. The single most complete published specification of what belongs in a conservation frame and what does not, including the list of materials it says are used in the majority of frame shops and should not be.
• What's behind your frame?, the same center. Two pages written for households: what to look for behind an existing frame, and the four questions to ask a framer.
• The full leaflet index, with the revision year of each. Useful for checking whether the leaflet you are reading is current.
• Preservation guidelines for matting and framing, Library of Congress. A component-by-component checklist you can hand to a framer.
• Preservation matting for works of art on paper, a practitioner supplement hosted by the same library, dated 1997. The clearest account anywhere of what the board trade names mean, plus the four-ply-over-four-ply spacing figure. Chemistry sound, product names of their time.
• Care, handling and storage of photographs, the same library. The statement that "photo-safe" means meeting the album and framing materials standard including passing the Photographic Activity Test. Note that its citation of the test's edition is behind the current one.
• Matting and framing, the American Institute for Conservation's Book and Paper Group wiki. A continuously maintained professional consensus document: hinge proportions, every adhesive weighed, sink mats, sealed packages, board-by-board notes, and a history section describing what you will find in an old frame.
• Matting and framing specifications for objects on paper, Conservation Center for Art & Historic Artifacts, updated July 2022. Short and specification-shaped, with the buffering percentage and the hinge spacing.
• Framing works of art on paper, Canadian Conservation Institute Notes 11/9. The 2 cm package figure, the backing board lists, and the warning about clip-together metal frames.
• Conservation framing of embroideries and other flat textiles, the same institute, Notes 13/17. Written explicitly for home display as well as museum collections, with the bluntest never-use list in this manual's research.
• Window mats for paper objects, National Park Service Conserve O Gram 13/1. The five criteria for museum-quality matting, the mat margin proportions, and the definition of acid mat burn.
• Exhibit mounting variations for objects on paper, the same series, 13/4. Four non-adhesive mounting methods with their limits stated honestly, and the buffered-against-unbuffered split by object type.
• Making mounting corners for photographs and paper objects, the same series, 14/1. Fold by fold, and the reason corners are made from unbuffered paper.
• Storage enclosures for photographic prints and negatives, the same series, 14/2. The clearest plain-language account of what the Photographic Activity Test detects. Its own standards citation is superseded; read the chemistry, not the number.
• A simple storage mat for textile fragments, the same series, 16/3. A mat built on print-and-drawing principles for a textile, with dimensions.
• Displaying family papers and photographs, the National Archives, reviewed July 2025. A federal agency writing directly to a household, including its own demonstration photograph of light damage.
• The Photographic Activity Test, the Image Permanence Institute, which developed it. What the two detectors look for, what is in scope, and what the test does not promise.

Levels, standards and the words on the label

• Four levels of framing, 2021, the Fine Art Trade Guild, a UK trade body. Seven pages, four graded specifications, each with a stated protective life under the Guild's own stated conditions. The only live graded framing specification found in this manual's research, and the backbone of What "archival" means.
• Quality standards for mountboard, the same body. What each board grade must actually contain, in measurable terms, and the sentence that the term "acid free" must be avoided in product specifications.
• ISO 18916:2025, the Photographic Activity Test, current edition. Catalogue record only; the standard itself is paywalled. Its scope, its status, and its statement that passing the test does not make a material archival.
• ISO 18902:2013, album, framing and storage materials, reviewed and confirmed 2023. The standard that actually defines photo-safe, and the one that covers modern inkjet prints.
• ISO 216:2007, the A and B paper series, confirmed 2021. Cited for its scope, which excludes posters, rather than for its dimensions, which are paywalled.
• ISO 105-B02:2014, the Blue Wool lightfastness method. Edition 6, confirmed 2025 but at the stage marked to be revised. The identity of the standard that every light-damage figure in this manual ultimately rests on.
• The Guild Certified Framer examination, the same UK trade body. What a bench qualification actually examines, task by task, including the worked mount specification quoted in Borders and the window.
• Certification, the Professional Picture Framers Association. What the two US credentials require, in the association's own words.

Glazing, light and the room

• Light, ultraviolet and infrared, Canadian Conservation Institute. The most complete published account of light damage in this manual's research: the Blue Wool dose table with and without ultraviolet, the ultraviolet share of fading, the lux conversion, the ultraviolet output of each lamp type, and the explanation of where 50 lux came from.
• Ultraviolet filters, the same institute, Notes 2/1. The only independent testing of filter performance found here, with the percentages and the spreads, against the marketing claims.
• Protection from light damage, Northeast Document Conservation Center, leaflet 02-04, updated 2024. The clearest statement of the annual lux-hour budget, with the arithmetic worked out. Note the manual does not repeat its claim that LEDs emit no ultraviolet.
• Protecting paper and book collections during exhibition, the same center, leaflet 02-05, 2020. The ultraviolet-filtering threshold for glazing, and the same lux and duration convention from a second leaflet.
• Temperature, relative humidity, light and air quality, the same center, leaflet 02-01, 2020. A chart of targets by material and space type, in Fahrenheit.
• Light exposure for artifacts on exhibition, Conservation Center for Art & Historic Artifacts, 2020. The lux-hour arithmetic worked twice, the three-category table with rotation intervals, and the published remark about smartphone light meter apps.
• Light duration guidelines for exhibited works of art and photographs, the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. The rotation table by material category, for artworks and separately for photographs, with its own rules about the most sensitive component.
• Guidelines for exhibition light levels for photographs, the Photographic Materials Group of the American Institute for Conservation, 2001. Annual lux-hour budgets by sensitivity class with matching dark-rest periods. Published in a volume whose front matter notes that papers were not peer reviewed.
• Limiting light damage, Library of Congress. Three sensitivity bands in footcandles with display durations and minimum dark-storage intervals, and the most detailed published list of which media fall in which class.
• Recommended light levels for museum collections, Texas Historical Commission, 2013. The same three-category ladder from a state agency, useful as evidence that it is one shared convention rather than several findings.
• Light damage and light control, Museums & Galleries of New South Wales. The Australian convention, which gives 200 lux where the North American sources give 150, and a rotation rule expressed as a display fraction.
• Monitoring light and UV radiation, Museums Galleries Scotland. What to look for when buying a meter, how often to recalibrate it, and the dosimeter principle.
• The light damage calculator's mathematical model, Canadian Heritage. A live government tool that estimates fading from lux, hours and sensitivity, and publishes its own dose formula, which is the one the exposure box uses.
• Choosing UV-filtering window films, National Park Service Conserve O Gram 3/10, 2004. A measured table of thirty commercial films, and the clearest published explanation of why "98 percent of UV filtered" on a label is misleading.
• Mold: prevention of growth in museum collections, the same series, 3/4, 2007. The relative humidity ceiling and the temperature band, which are the numbers behind every "not in a bathroom" rule.
• Design and construction handbook, art lighting section, Los Angeles World Airports. A public agency design standard that quotes the paywalled museum lighting recommended practice: the aiming angle, the track position, the illuminance band and the lamp specification. Note those illuminance figures are far above the conservation ceilings.
• Guidelines for selecting solid-state lighting for museums, by authors at two conservation institutes. Efficacy and lifetime comparisons, the honest statement of LED infrared output, and the colour rendering threshold. Its successor technical bulletin is named on its publisher's own index but was not published as a readable document during this manual's research.
• Demonstration assessment of LED accent lighting in a museum, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory for the Department of Energy. Spectral band definitions and measured lamp specifications in a real gallery. Its LED product figures are of their date.
• Museum lighting research, the Getty Conservation Institute. The framing of light as the one environmental risk that cannot be eliminated, and the four levers for controlling it.

Maker figures, cited as product facts

These are makers' published claims about their own products, read on 2026-11-03. They are product facts, never the source of a conservation principle.

• Conservation clear glass, museum glass, conservation acrylic, anti-reflective anti-static acrylic and laminated glass, Tru Vue. Thicknesses, maximum sheet sizes, reflection, transmission and ultraviolet claims, plus the trade definition of a "UV protection" label and the maker's own list of when not to use glass.
• Acrylic sheet physical properties, Röhm, and acrylic typical properties, Plaskolite. Two makers publishing a specific gravity of 1.19 under two different test methods, which is the basis of every acrylic weight in this manual, plus the only published abrasion figures found.
• Approximate weight of architectural flat glass, National Glass Association figures via a distributor, and the original 2008 bulletin. The weight table in both unit systems, with the density for any thickness not on it.
• Frame types and designing mats for standard sizes, Logan Graphic Products. The rabbet defined, the nominal-against-actual figure, the trade size list, and why those sizes exist.
• About our standard mat openings and picture frame sizes, Frame Destination. One maker's published overlap practice in numbers, and its frame and mat opening table.
• Crop ratios, a photographic printing lab. Which print sizes share an aspect ratio, which is why a camera file does not fit an 8 by 10 frame.
• Cartridge wedges, Cassese. The sizes and material grades of the fasteners that hold a mitred wood frame together. No maker chart mapping wedge size to rabbet depth was found anywhere.

Hanging, walls, hardware and safety

• Heavy-duty hollow-wall anchor technical bulletin, self-drilling anchor bulletin, hollow-wall anchor bulletin and the solid-wall anchor catalogue page, TOGGLER. Ultimate tensile and shear figures by base material and drywall thickness, measured in independent laboratory tests, with the conditions each assumes.
• Frequently asked questions, the same maker. The quarter-of-ultimate rule in the maker's own words, and the point that a load held away from the wall greatly reduces what an anchor allows. The single most useful page in this group.
• The same anchor's product page, for comparison: the ultimate figure quoted as "supports up to", with no safety factor mentioned.
• Masonry screw technical notes, ITW Red Head. Ultimate figures in concrete and hollow block by diameter and embedment, with edge-distance and spacing reduction factors.
• Weight capacity of each track, cable and hook and what is the 57-inch rule, AS Hanging Display Systems. The most complete per-component capacity table for a rail system found here, and a maker attributing the 57 inch height to custom rather than to a standard.
• Hooks and cords and the multirail sheet, STAS. Per-combination capacities, and a rail published per linear metre with its fixing frequency.
• Picture rail hook directions, The Gallery System. A maker stating in print that two hangers double the rating, with its two conditions footnoted.
• Single strap adjustable hangers, Picture Hang Solutions. A second maker stating that two hangers double capacity, with no test conditions published.
• Picture wire, Lion Picture Framing Supplies. A trade supplier's own margin advice, and the clearest illustration that a wire's named weight is a maximum picture weight rather than a breaking strength.
• Techniques for hanging and presenting art, The Arts Commission with the Toledo Museum of Art, September 2025. The hook arithmetic worked, the hardware list, salon spacing, and the instruction to decide the rules before making holes.
• How to hang work at gallery standard centre, Alberta University of the Arts. A nine-step procedure with two D-rings and two hooks, worked at 58 inches and calling the figure a rule of thumb.
• Guidelines for accessible exhibition design, the Smithsonian Accessibility Program, 2011 edition. The only agency-grade viewing heights found in this research, and they are lower than the gallery convention.
• Create your own salon wall, the High Museum of Art, 2020. The floor-layout-and-photograph method, anchors first, the spacing margin, sight lines, and the history of the salon hang.
• Five tips for a salon-style hang, Rise Art, a gallery. A fourth published centre-height figure, 150 cm, and a tighter spacing figure, for comparison with the museum sources.
• Fabricating secure hangers for framed works of art, National Park Service Conserve O Gram 2/7, 1994. Hand-made security hooks with dimensions, and the interlocking arrangement whose stated purpose is to stop a picture falling in an earthquake.
• Storage screens for paintings, the same series, 12/1, 1993. A buildable screen with real dimensions, the stud spacing convention, and the earthquake hook substitution.
• Repairing historic flat plaster, National Park Service Preservation Brief 21. What is actually behind a plaster wall, coat by coat, which is why anchors behave differently there.
• Basic wood framing, a municipal building authority reproducing the residential code's stud table, and a state rule adopting and amending it. Where the 16 and 24 inch stud spacing convention is actually published.
• Eye and face protection and ladders, Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The side-protection requirement and the consensus-standard editions the rule accepts; the one-in-four ladder angle and the top-step prohibition.
• Basic ladder safety, the American Ladder Institute. The three-points-of-contact rule and the belt-buckle rule, from the body that writes the ladder standards.
• The lifting equation, Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety, restating the NIOSH equation. The 23 kilogram load constant and the six multipliers that reduce it.
• Lead renovation, repair and painting program and protect your family from asbestos, Environmental Protection Agency. The pre-1978 trigger and who the rule binds; and the agency naming drilling among the activities that release asbestos fibers.
• Anchor It!, Consumer Product Safety Commission. Recorded as a negative finding: the federal wall-safety campaign covers furniture and television tip-overs and does not mention pictures or mirrors.
• 16 CFR Part 1201, the federal safety standard for architectural glazing materials. The 9 square foot line and the two impact categories, which cover doors and panels rather than picture frames.
• Laboratory sharps and laboratory glass, a university environmental health and safety office. A concrete broken-glass procedure, because no agency publishes a household version.

Living with pictures: care, storage, moving, records

• Cleaning paintings: precautions, Canadian Conservation Institute Notes 10/1. The never-do list for living with a framed painting, the reason behind it, and the splash protocol.
• Storage and display guidelines for paintings, the same institute, Notes 10/3. The figures for stacking framed work against a wall at home.
• Backing boards for paintings on canvas, the same institute, Notes 10/10. The ranked materials, the screw sizes and spacings, and its own climate caveat.
• Framing a painting, the same institute, Notes 10/8. Clearance, rabbet modification, padding, the stretcher keys, and the frame as part of the work's history.
• Emergency salvage of flood damaged family papers, the National Archives. The framed-item rule, the drying method, and what not to freeze.
• Packing a framed two-dimensional object, National Park Service Conserve O Gram 17/6, 2009. A step-by-step pack for a small framed picture, with the exclusions that matter.
• How do I decide about insurance, published by the American Institute for Conservation. Scheduled against blanket coverage, and the distinction between fair market value and retail replacement value.
• Caring for belongings, the same body. Where its public guides are, and its find-a-professional service, which is the referral path a federal agency and a museum conservator both point households to.
• Home insurance guide, Texas Department of Insurance, updated June 2026. A regulator stating that home policies limit what they pay for art, what an endorsement is, and why an inventory matters. Also the warning that "appraisal" names a claim dispute process in insurance.
• Home inventory guide, California Department of Insurance. A regulator's inventory procedure and update cadence.
• Find an appraiser, International Society of Appraisers, and the American Society of Appraisers, whose Personal Property discipline is the one that covers art. Named because "possibly valuable" needs somewhere to go; this manual values nothing and recommends nobody.
• New York arts and cultural affairs law, section 15.01 and section 15.03. One state's disclosure requirements for prints and photographs, cited as a labelled example of the kind of paperwork worth keeping with a piece.
• The Conserve O Gram index, National Park Service. The map of free federal leaflets, with the year of each, which is how to check whether the one you are reading has been revised.

Other Field Assembly manuals

• Learn Interior Lighting: layers and glare, and working with an electrician. Choosing and aiming a fixture, and the room side of reflections.
• Learn Space Planning: measure and draw the room. If you want the whole room to scale rather than one wall.
• Learn Digital Photo Care: prints, slides and negatives. Getting a good scan made, which is what the copy-on-the-wall answer depends on.
• Learn Color Design: develop a palette. If the frames and the room are fighting.
• Plan Your House Move: moving service scopes. For anything beyond a car boot.

What this manual could not find

Recorded here so the gaps are visible rather than papered over. In each case the manual either computes a figure and labels it, or says plainly that nobody publishes one.

• A weight-per-thickness table for acrylic. Computed from the specific gravity two makers publish.
• Moulding and board weight per foot or per square foot. Our own allowances, stated with their basis in the weight box.
• A rated standard for picture wire, D-rings, screw eyes or strap hangers. None found with a test basis.
• A minimum art-to-glazing gap in millimetres. Stated in plies by every source; the only numeric anchors are a sixteenth of an inch from a four-ply package and half a centimetre for a painting.
• How long a sealed package holds humidity in a house. One note offers many weeks to years for a glazed painting; nothing equivalent for paper.
• A replacement interval for a mat package. One practitioner says matboard takes in pollution and should be changed periodically, with no number of years.
• A wedge size to rabbet depth chart. Sizes and grades are published; no depth mapping was found.
• A code setback figure for cable and pipe behind a wall. Not freely published, and the free sources disagreed on how it is measured, so this manual prints none.
• Any figure or threshold for glazing over a bed or a crib. None found; the federal child-safety campaign covers furniture and televisions.
• A residential picture-light illuminance figure at a readable price. The museum lighting recommended practice is paywalled, and its figures reach this manual through a public agency standard that quotes it.
• A conservation figure for ultraviolet-filtering curtains or blinds. Window film is well measured; curtains are not.
• Any price for custom framing. None published anywhere in this research, so this manual makes no cost claim.
• Household-scale condition reporting. No source at any scale smaller than an institution; ours is built down from the institutional form and labelled.
• Household shadow boxes and objects in a frame. One institute covers flat textiles stitched to a covered support and stops there.
• Stair walls, hallways, corners, the wall around a television, matting to unify a group and mixing frame finishes. No institutional, university, arts-council or named-practitioner source for any of them, which is why Difficult places is written as our practice.
• Grid spacing, the gap above furniture and the two-thirds rule. No publisher; one page credits a design body with no citation, which this manual does not repeat.