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This was a great frame project.  A customer brought in “Charles” with several other items to frame for her.  He is a charcoal drawing done by an artist in the late 1800’s who was a distant relative of my customer. She said probably from Denmark.  Another drawing she had was a detailed botanical drawing in pen and ink of a few plants. Both drawings were very well done.  First we designed our frame package choosing mats, glass and moulding. 

The portrait was intriguing. He looked to be a stalwart man, probably a farm hand.

I called him “Charles”. There are no notes or references on the back of the drawing.

This artist was at a professional level.  The paper is very similar to the Mi Teintes drawing papers of today.  It was brittle with age, wrinkled and torn.  

I went to work; first I gently straighten out all the folds and wrinkles, then pressed it between to sheets of mat board.  I put the sandwich between several layers of cardboard and pressed it for a couple weeks.   That flattened it out so I could then use archival tape to repair the rips.  I found similar paper to patch the hole, which fortunately, was in a background area of the drawing.  Using charcoal I matched the gradient as best I could. It looked fine from a distance.    

When I was happy with the restorative process I proceeded to frame it with archival mats, conservation reflection control glass and a dark brown, old style frame to coincide with the age of the drawing.