What is Strip-Lining?
- John Leschak
- Jun 19
- 3 min read
What do you do when there is not enough canvas or material available to properly stretch or wrap / lace a piece of artwork? There is a technique known as "striplining" which can solve this problem by extending the edges of the piece and using archival and reversible adhesives to accomplish this.
When you need to wrap the edges of the piece either around a backing board or around a stretcher or strainer, you need to have sufficient excess to secure to the back of the rigid substrate (often with a lacing method). In the case of a canvas artwork, the rigid substrate is most often a stretcher (keyed/adjustable corners) or strainer (fixed/rigid corners) and for cross-stitch and needlepoint, a 6 or 8-ply acid-free backing board is commonly used.
You can find more info on the stretchers and strainers here.
Striplining is a pretty simple concept (albeit time consuming) which is to cut strips of similar material to the base of the artwork and using adhesive, adhere them to the 4 sides, thus extending them and making them available to secure. These are not visible and are adhered on the back of the material. If any of the new material being added will overlap to the front of the artwork, we will often fray the material to thin out and allow for an even smooth transition from the new to existing material.
Materials and Tools Used:
Beva 371 Film (or alternatively a fabric glue)
Tacking iron (we use a Seal Sealector III tacking iron)
Similar weight fabric strips 3-4 inches wide, long enough to cover the entire perimeter of the artwork.
The strips are adhered most commonly with an archival solution called Beva 371 (which we get from TalasOnline.com) in a film form. We cut the film to strips between 1/2" and 1.5" depending on the application. The Beva 371 film is heat activated at a temperature of 150F and we use a tack iron to achieve this. Beva 371 is a fully reversible solution with heat and any remaining solution removed with hexane or acetone. Beva 371 film is a reasonably expensive solution, costing over $150 in roll film form.
I am not going into the details of applying the Beva 371 film and will leave that for a possible future blog post.
There is also a less expensive approach which is to use fabric glue and it also has a very strong bond, but can be difficult to remove. We use Frank's Fabric Glue (from FranksFabrics.com) if we need to take this approach. Similar products would also work as well.
Once the art piece is extended, then it can be mounted using whatever method you are using, whether it is stretching the canvas to a stretcher or strainer, or using a lace method to mount the cross-stitch or needlepoint to a backing board.
While striplining is not a tremendously complex process, to do it properly, it can take 1-3 hours depending on the size and material of the artwork. Stripling a canvas artwork 24"x30" would cost around $70 and a piece 36"x48" would cost around $110....this would be in addition to the canvas stretching or mounting costs. SecondMoonshot has already invested in these tools and materials in bulk so we can perform this service cheaper than you could do it yourself for 1 or 2 pieces. If you need a large quantity done, then you can work with us to buy small volumes of our bulk supplies and we will be happy to mentor you through the process so you can do it yourself.
Here are some various picture showing the results.
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