6.5 Saving the frames: restorer's fight with time | Interview with Rollo Whately. Part 2

Part 2 of our interview with Rollo Whately is live! Don't forget to check out Part 1 as well ;) Rollo is a restorer, frames collector and dealer. We sat down at his workshop in the center of London and talked about art.

In this conversation, you’ll discover:
- how frame design has moved from pure function to a celebrated art form across centuries, and what that means for your collection;  
- what stands behind the meticulous process of conserving and restoring antique frames; 
- is frame restoration a viable career or business?

Let me know if you liked this episode by commenting and rating our show. Your support means the world to me! 

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:07

And today we are releasing the part two with Rolla Watley uh of our interview for Phantom of the Robbins. Talking about craft, how you would you have a usual day, like a day of a frame uh restoring a concert, or there is no usual day uh for you.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Day.

SPEAKER_00 0:32

Yeah, no, in a in a workshop, like what's starred by.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Oh, I see. Oh, the normal day. Well, I normally come in and I take about two hours to warm up and have two cups of coffee. Um we put some glue on on a Monday morning. So a lot of the well, some of the work we do is here anyway. We have rabbit skin glue, which is animal glue, so that needs soaking and preparing. I keep the workshop downstairs um quite tidy. Um I don't like too much mess, although it looks messy um sometimes, but everything I know where it is. So you've got to be clean and tidy because sometimes pictures are coming here which are both fragile and valuable. I mean really valuable. Sometimes millions of pounds worth of picture might come in to be fitted or something, and then you've got to be very careful. So it's important that although it looks like a Dickensian shop, and it can be a bit messy, that everything is uh in order. There are places where you're not allowed to put liquid, there are places where you only put this and you don't put leave things on the ground in case it's a flood at night, and all those things. So you have to have lots of experience. Um as a day goes, no, there's no normal day. Um the day could be taken over um as we experienced it today by an auction, or it can be taken over by someone coming in, or it can be taken over by um just me working downstairs on you know, if it's a quiet day a Friday or Monday, I might be downstairs just working on things with some music on. So it it there's no normal day. And it's it's my shop, so I don't know if I have to come in every day even now.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

So your particular type of music, classic?

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Sometimes classical, yes. Yes, they were listening to Shostukovich piano preludes, but the week before it was something else.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

No, nice. And how many projects do you like would be usually ongoing at the same time?

SPEAKER_01 2:31

Uh that's changed since COVID. Uh pre-COVID it was 40 or 50, and now it's more like 30.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

Oh, you need a very good discipline, I guess, too.

SPEAKER_01 2:41

You've got to keep all the balls in the air, yeah. Um but things are out different workshops, and they'll like perhaps the frame's being made in one place and it'll come back finishing. What's being made in one place come back finish, but we're waiting for a mount or mat to come from the mat maker, and then we've got to order some optium in perspective from somewhere else, or we're doing a job at the moment where we order some antique mirror glass. Well, that's coming from the antique mirror glass supplier in Norfolk, and they'll send the glass, and it'll arrive in a couple of weeks, and we'll put those into the frames which are going to San Francisco. So there's a lot of yes, pulling things together. And I know lots of people, as I said earlier, that are really good at their jobs um in London. So um, and we have a great guy with a car who drives things around, and um, so that's what I do is glue things together a bit and make sure that everything goes out looking perfect.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

So your sort of is uh I must put it the boss of this big operation.

SPEAKER_01 3:43

Well, they're not the boss of the operation, they're all their own bosses, which is which is great because um I think then people are able to control their own lives. And I'm happy for that to be the case.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

Uh of course. And uh was there i i is there any seasonal uh societal We've just done freeze, so we did a few things for Freeze Masters, not many, but enough to keep us busy.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

And being so small doesn't need to be a lot to keep me busy. Um yes, there is a season, there's the build-up to Maastricht, and there's a quieter time in the summer. Um but and there'll be auctions. But now, as I said earlier, that with more private clients, there's much less of that seasonal flow. Um because the seasonal flow was much more to do with the trade for fairs and for auctions, and for the summer season, well, that doesn't really exist anymore. So um yes, there's freeze and there's maastricht, but the July thing doesn't seem to be there in the same way it was now that Masterpiece has gone and Grosvenor House and all those big fairs. So it's not as seasonal as it was, is the answer to that question. But January we will be busy, I hope, fingers crossed.

SPEAKER_00 5:05

And what was the oldest frame that you've restored?

SPEAKER_01 5:10

The oldest frame, um probably early 16th century. Um possibly late 15th century. I don't I I don't know if we've ever had anything really, really old like you'd find in a National Gallery or something. And and I would be careful to do restoration on those. I think I might probably not do that myself. I'd give that to someone who is more specialized than I am.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

And um is there was there any project in the past that still resonates with you today that you have done?

SPEAKER_01 5:49

We once did, I don't know why I can think of it. We once did just before Christmas one year, we did a whole 24 or 30 of the volal suite like Picasso prints. And the frames were made in one place and finished by someone else who did a fantastic job, and I remember that job because it was a it was a really good profit, and it was great fun, and there were 30 of them to fit, and we all stayed late and fitted them. It was things like that in the old days when we got big groups in and there were perhaps m more people here than um and it was fun. It it's a bit less fun now. Um, but we did have fun in the old days. So yeah, they still re I still think of those as the good times.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

Oh of course it has the basically modern ways of people seeing the pictures change the way they perceive the frames.

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Oh yes. Partly because twenty years ago there was no internet. So people had to come in and look at things. And they did. Now they send me an email saying, Can you suggest some frames for this picture? Which is in New York or wherever it is, and you suggest frames and they say, Well, go for number three. And you do number three, and someone's giving you sizes, and you never see it with a picture. So that's one way it's changed. The other way is that I did notice that sometimes people come in here and they if they do come in here, they look at it hadn't happened so much recently, but about four or five years ago, we put something on the floor, the picture, and put a frame on top of it, and they look at it through their phone. Because that's the only way that people can see things was through the sort of Instagram lens. And I thought that was bizarre. But um it the internet has changed everything. It's it's it would change everything. I mean, people can buy frames at auctions that in the past I only I would have known about, or me and the trade. Now it's all very public, you know, uh which is good. But um it's also changed the way that the art market, our business operates. And clients can choose from their phone. Um things that so you have to be very careful to make sure that you give them exactly the right choices. And guess that's why they keep coming back, because they're relying on your taste, because really you can't see on a phone. You just can't see. Um you can't see colour balance, the surface. None of it makes sense on a flat image with the light coming from behind. So um I hope that's why they keep coming back, is because we get it right. And so when they do see the actual picture in New York or London or wherever it is, it looks really good, and they think, oh that that turned out right. And um don't realise how much thought and care has gone into it, um, because all they did was see it on their phone. Um When we buy things on Amazon, you get your package through and you're often very disappointed. I hope my customers aren't as disappointed as I am when I buy things on Amazon. And it's about this big when you expect it to be this big. You know, or it doesn't fit all, you know. Um so it has changed a lot.

SPEAKER_00 9:06

And also I wanted to ask you more about restoration and conservation, also new methods. I I remember you mentioned uh the um rabbit glue, but are there any new methods of restoration and conservation?

SPEAKER_01 9:21

Absolutely no pretty much no new methods of restoration. The way we gild is the way people have gilded for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Um the ancient Egyptians use gold leaf. Um the Romans use gold leaf. Um and gold leaf has been applied in the same way since the Quadrocento in Europe, and we use exactly the same materials. We use Italian gesso if it's an Italian frame, we use the same glues, we use the same pigments. Um and uh I like that very much. There's very few examples of modern alkids and cup chemical finishes, but mostly it's it's just pigment and glue.

SPEAKER_00 10:10

And is there any um uh difference in the tradition depending on the l location of uh the frame and the way how gilded was done.

SPEAKER_01 10:23

I'm sure there is, Dario. Um yes. Um as I said, the French craftsmen, the French workshops were very regimented. Italians were much more if you read Cannino Cennini, he says, say a prayer before you mix your glue. You know, say Hail Mary, because you know that'll make the glue better. So the Italians might have a different way of doing it um in the 15th, 16th centuries than the French in the 18th centuries, but it's all essentially essentially the same. Um and uh craftsman. I'll just track back a bit. Frames are often completely untouched. Paintings are very rarely untouched, furniture is very rarely untouched. Um frames are often completely as they were made. They've never been cleaned or uh altered, they're just 400 years old, never been touched, which is very, very unusual in the world of antiques and paintings. So and they were made by great craftsmen. Really lovely, um, really good craftsmen. So um that's what's exciting about frames, is they can be very original. And how does one decide to intervene when you when you would if it's if it's if if if you want to keep it alive, as I said, I used that expression earlier, um, to keep a frame going, then you might have to do something to it. You might have to consolidate it if it's got woodworm, um, you might have to repair broken gesso. But you try to do it with the minimum intervention. Um But on the other hand, to be honest, I'm a business, and if I've got a a frame that I don't mind reducing in size, and someone's got a painting which suits the frame very well, then I'll cut the frame down. So I'm doing you know, elective damage to something, but then is it better reduced to in size and repaired and actually on a picture, or just sitting here in my rags, and I reckon sometimes it's better off to being used again. Cause remember, you have to think, all the frames around us here were made for paintings once.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

Of course.

SPEAKER_01 12:35

Um they've been taken off paintings by people and replaced by something else. So it's just like America around, they're all just going round and round in circles, so I don't really mind being part of that.

SPEAKER_00 12:49

And um what is the main factor in your opinion that the fact the French longevity How well it's made.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Okay, uh w with which it's made. And attention to detail, which is something I haven't mentioned before, is something I I I paid particular attention to detail. Um it's very important to pay attention to detail and if something is sloppily done it won't last. Which is good. And if something's well made, it will last. And um that's all you can say about it. Um as long as it hasn't got damp, and it's essentially it's well made and well looked after, it'll last forever. Gold leaf doesn't change. That's why they use it. It looks expensive, but it also doesn't tarnish or oxidize at all. And it's very, very stable. And the rabbits give the animal glues made and used in framing are incredibly stable. Wood can be very, very stable. So frames can last for um hundreds of years.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

And what do you think what are the qualities a person should possess? What are the main qualities for someone to work with the frames to restore them, to conserve them, to that's a very good question.

SPEAKER_01 14:05

I don't know, because I um I think they just need to find the frame world on their own. You have to have attention to detail, but not an over attention to detail. You have to have eyes in your head and you have to be um prepared to make mistakes to learn, because the only way you can learn is not really by going to school, but by making mistakes like everything else. Um you just have to learn and um and be uh uh uh uh able to take on board different solvents, different ways of um uh achieving a result. So you've got to be quite practical and gotta have eyes in your head, I suppose, is the answer to the question.

SPEAKER_00 14:55

And I have as I have seen this lovely young gentleman who is now working for you and learning from you, and you've mentioned you've taken students before, which uh I believe is uh an amazing thing, uh being able to teach someone else, someone you can you tell us a bit more about it, about the process of teaching helpers?

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Very seldom do people come to me looking for work. Summer jobs are nothing, but when they do, I always say yes. Um because I'm very happy to anyone who wants to join in, I know how difficult it is to find a life and a career and a job. So anyone who asks yes, we had somebody in the summer called Amy, we've had Wilfrid, who we might um see in a moment downstairs. It takes a very long time to learn. But I will say that Boris, who was here for 10 or 12 years, was a portrait Christie's. He worked at Christie's South Cam when it still existed, and he came here, and now he's he went on to do a woodcarving course, and now he runs his own workshop. And um, so he's launched, and I work with him still, and another guy, Spencer, who I work with, used to work for me. So I'm very happy if that happens. I'm very open. Some craftsmen keep their arm around their homework. You remember like the girls at school you're doing their homework like that. Um, other people I'm very happy to share everything I know because I can't say it's not mine.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

And we've mentioned it before, but I just wanted to ask it for uh also for our lovely viewers that there are quite a few, as uh as you said, uh places where one can learn the craft of uh restoration conservation. But uh actually one learns more from another uh restorer and uh conserver. Can you tell us a bit more?

SPEAKER_01 16:57

I I think I mean the city in Gilles does a course I think in except in carbon, I think frame conservation, it is important, and especially for museum work to learn how to do that by the book. But I think if you really want to work in the commercial world, the best place is to learn in a workshop. In the old days I say the old days in the beginning of the 20th century, there were huge frame workshops with 20 or 30 people working there. And if you were an apprentice, you spent the first three years washing brushes and sweeping the floor before you were left you know anywhere near things. So it was a long process. Um We can't do that now because I can't afford to have someone here just washing brushes for three years. But um I I I do think you can learn the most um by being in a workshop and seeing diff and having different jobs to do. Doing repairs is a really good way of learning. When someone gives you a something that's broken, I think I learned a lot by doing repairs. And you have to cast a bit of composition motif, or you have to carve a little tiny bit in, or you have to do some filling with putty um or gesso and then make the surface right, that's when you learn. It's when you're actually sort of digging down into how the thing was made in the first place and trying to replicate that. So the best way of learning is doing repairs.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

And uh what are the devices you can or offer or tell someone who wants to become one-day frame or restaurant?

SPEAKER_01 18:37

Just look keep looking at frames. Go to the National Gallery, which have really concentrated on frames in the last 15-20 years, and look at auctions of frames. Come to my shop, go to other places, and just begin to enjoy frames. And I think it's when you've when your eyes are opened to uh the way things are made and what they look like, then that's a very good way of getting started. Um there's no specific advice, um, and I wouldn't encourage anyone to get uh to devote themselves quite at the moment to the world of frames in London where the art market's changing so rapidly. But there are gonna be a lot of changes in the next few years in the business of frames as well, because a lot of us are getting on. Um so there will be lots of changes, and um now's a good time to buy frames.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

And how you think the opening of VA storage, which has a lot of like it's it's quite heavy on showing people the furniture and various frames as well, and also it has the restorian conservators working in front of the people, how will it affect everything the market and also young people?

SPEAKER_01 19:51

I hope it encourages young people, your generation, to look at old things carefully and with pleasure. Um I've got younger children and they do spend a lot of time on screens, and I think even your generation spend a lot of time looking at screens. There is some world beyond the screens, and it is a world of things which are three-dimensional and you can pick up and you can bend and you can use and I do hope that the VA in the east part of London, which I haven't actually visited yet, um encourages people and makes people I could keep saying this open your eyes and look around you and see what what things are like. But look at buildings, look at architecture, um and and and and look at pictures and frames.

SPEAKER_00 20:41

Of course. Of course, of course, and uh finally after so many years being devoted to uh this lovely craft, this lovely is what keeps what what keeps your passion, what uh sustains that what inspires you every year.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

What inspires me? Well, that's uh two different questions. What keeps me going is I've got a thousand picture frames here, and no one else is gonna sell them except me. Um so I've got to come into work. Um what keeps me going is I still like it as you can tell. Um and I still got a sense of humor about frames. I s I'm still learning, Daria. Um I'm still learning different ways of doing things. And it's worth saying, I'll tell you, um I'm still uh excited when I get uh you know got an eat trick up my sleeve to make something look better than I've ever been able to make it look before. So that's that's still fun. Um it's it's fun. I mean doing this is fun, and uh buying things is fun, and um rescuing things is fun and selling things is fun. So now I'm still here for a little while. Um but um that's what keeps me coming in. Nowhere else to go. Somebody rang up and they wanted a box to display jewellery in, and I happen to have this box and she's been a client for a long time. And um we're just doing well Wilfrid's doing some repairs. This is Wilfrid. And um he has um he's just doing some repairs to some gesso damage. So we've filled it. Um and he's going to put some silver leaf on it. Uh because this is silver. Sometimes frames are made out of silver rather than gold, and the silver would sometimes be lacquered, partly to stop it oxidizing and going black, and partly to make it a goldy colour. So you can make silver look like gold by putting a yellow varnish on it, and um it was cheaper.

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Thank you, Rolo, so so much. And we are uh again here at the Rolo's workshop at 41 St. James's place, and yeah, just an amazing frame workshop. So please, if you're in St. James or if you're in London, or just if you need a frame, that's the best place to go.

SPEAKER_01 23:06

Yeah, good coffee machine too.

SPEAKER_00 23:09

Thank you so much. Thank you, Rolo.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

Not at all.