This year, you and the rest of your office worked hard, put in the extra hours, and really wowed the business world. Whether you’ve broken some kind of business record, or have made enormous contributions to your community, your work ethic and never-say-die attitude have earned you the enviable distinction of making headlines in a major publication.
No matter what kind of publication you are featured in, good news is something that you want to save for all of your friends, family, coworkers, and customers so that they can see it too. The question is, how can you best preserve and present your featured article to others?
When preserving an article for public display, there are several things that you should take into consideration:
- Where/how you want to display the article.
- How long the display will last.
- Who you are going to show the article to (the intended audience).
- The material the article is printed on.
- The readability of the article.
- The attractiveness of the display.
These factors will influence the way in which you preserve your positive news articles.
With these factors in mind, what is a common method for preserving and presenting an article?
One common method that many people choose to use when showing off a newspaper article is to hang the article in a picture frame, especially if the article has photographs.
After all, we commonly mount pictures of ourselves and our family in a frame, why not do the same with an article? A well-designed frame can be a relatively inexpensive and attractive way to present your article, with a few special considerations:
Framing A Newspaper Article
If your featured article is from the pages of a newspaper, the first thing you are going to need to do is to find a way to prevent the highly-acidic wood-pulp paper from eating away at itself.
The first step for doing this is to separate the pages of the newspaper. Odds are, since you want to make a display of your article, you will make a cut-out of your article anyways, but even if you want to display the whole page, make sure it is unfolded so that the paper is not in contact with itself.
It is also important to prevent the paper from being exposed to prolonged contact with metal, such as paperclips and staples, as such objects can leave a permanent mark on the paper or shorten the lifespan of the paper.
If you want to preserve the article for a long period of time, consider making a photocopy of the original article to use for display, while placing the original in an acid-free box, with the pages separated by non-acidic paper to act as a buffer material, then store the box in a cool, dry place. Using a photocopy may not seem as attractive an option as keeping the original paper on display, but it will allow you to keep the original article intact for longer.
If you really want to put that original piece of newspaper print in the frame, and want it to last as long as possible, try mounting the article in a frame with UV-resistant glass with an acid-free backing board.
Alternatively, you can laminate the article and then mount it in the picture frame. Laminating the article (after neutralizing the paper’s high acidity, there are products for doing this) can keep the paper safe from moisture and other elements when done correctly.
Depending on the size of your article, and whether or not it was all on one page of the newspaper, you may need to spend a considerable amount of time finding a frame that is large enough to contain the whole article, but not so oversized that the article leaves large amounts of empty space.
Framing A Magazine Article
Generally speaking, the material on which a magazine article is printed tends to be higher quality than the wood pulp used in newspapers, which in turn can make the process for framing a magazine cover or article slightly easier than the process for preserving a newspaper article.
Of course, not all magazines are created equally, so you may have to adjust your preservation and display method according to the quality of the paper.
When looking for a frame for a magazine article, you will want to measure the dimensions of the magazine itself. If you just want to show off your cover spot on the magazine, you can just take the cover dimensions and add an inch to each side in order to create a border around the image to maintain a professional appearance. If you want to show off an article that is a two-page spread, then open up the magazine and measure it when it is pressed flat. It is important not to assume that you can just double the width of the cover, since that does not take into account the thickness of the magazine’s “spine.”
If the magazine proves to be too thick to fit in the confines of a frame, you can carefully cut out the cover or pages that you want to have framed. If you want to, you can frame each page individually, or find a jumbo-sized picture frame to hold every page at once (you may need two copies of the magazine for articles that are double-sided prints). The specific method for removing the cover and the article pages will vary depending on whether the magazine is bound with a staple or with glue. In most cases, it is easier to unbind pages that are stapled, since the removal of the staple unbinds the entire magazine.
If you want to, you can laminate the pages before placing them in the frame so as to protect them from the elements.
Finally, slide in the magazine pages just like you would a large photograph and voila, you have a framed magazine cover or article.
While placing laminated articles under glass can preserve them, keep in mind that glossy laminate under glossy glass can make it hard to read the article itself. To counter this, place the display in an area with “soft” lighting where glare will be less severe.
Another Option
Of course, there’s a third option for preserving any newspaper or magazine article, even from an online publication: plaque it!
A professionally arranged and engraved plaque from That’s Great News seals the article or magazine cover from the elements even more effectively than simple laminate, and gives you an attractive decorative display to mount your article with to boot. You can customize the engraving to give the name of the publication, the date of the achievement, or even to name the key personnel who made earning the plaque possible in the first place.
If you would like to check out our custom plaque creation process, or have more questions about how to immortalize your positive press, contact us for more information.
However you decide to preserve and commemorate your major achievements this year, we here at That’s Great News wish you well for the new year.