Rhea Allen & Cloudland Framing: A Perfect Fit

As the owner of Cloudland Framing in Mentone, Rhea Allen is one of those lucky people whose hobby is their work.

“I started framing in college, in a shop in Atlanta,” she says. “That was back in 2010 or so, and it definitely made an impression.” Over the years, even as she pursued other lines of work, she’d stop in a frame shop to see if they needed help. If she was lucky, they did. Then in 2022 Tom Emory, owner of Mountain Framing just outside Mentone, posted on Facebook that he was selling his business.

“My mother, who has a house up here, sent me the Facebook post and said, ‘Do you want to do this?’ I was living in Atlanta, post-Covid, trying to figure out how I wanted to make my life look different, and I thought, you know, this could be the perfect opportunity. So I did it. I moved up here, bought Tom’s inventory, and started Cloudland Framing. I studied art in college and feel like this is a good creative outlet for me.”

One day last month, her work table was covered with drawings and paintings that were headed to the Taste of Mentone auction, an annual fundraiser for MERF (Mentone Educational Resources Foundation). The pictures are donated. Sometimes the artist who donates the piece of art comes in and picks out a frame from her inventory, or they bring in their own frame. Rhea donates her time to readying the works for sale and contributes any materials she can. Otherwise, materials are offered at cost. “This is not a money maker for me,” she says.

Framing as a Form of Artistic Expression

Cloudland Framing is the only option if you want something framed in Mentone, but there are several more such shops in the greater surrounding area. Does she worry about competition?

“It’s funny, I don’t see them as competition,” she says. “There’s enough framing to go around. Different shops do different things. It’s all framing, but different people have different eyes for the design. I don’t think there’s one correct way to frame something. What I think looks good is different from what someone else might think looks good. I do everything by hand. I build the frames, I cut my mats by hand. But in Rome, there’s a shop that has a computerized mat cutter, and she helps me out if there’s something I can’t do by hand. It’s really good to have that collaborative aspect. There’s also a huge framing community on Facebook, where if you have a question, there are framers all over the world who will offer their suggestions or their perspectives,” Rhea explains.

“There are a lot of women in this business. There’s a women’s framing group. We were having this conversation recently, about how the majority of frame shop owners are women. I think every single one around here is.” Rhea keeps up with publications about the framing trade, but she hasn’t felt compelled to write about her expertise. “I know what I know and I think I have really good knowledge, but I don’t feel the need to impart it.”

Rhea (pronounced RAY-a) has lived most of her life in Atlanta. Her mother, Helen, has a house on Lookout Mountain, just inside the Georgia state line, where Rhea spent a couple of her childhood years. She went to college at Georgia State in Atlanta and got a degree in Studio Art, thinking at first that she wanted to be an art teacher. She later realized that was not her dream. She got into restaurant work for the next decade or so, waitressing, bartending, and managing. Then came COVID, which up-ended that industry, as it did so many others. She felt that her life had reached a tipping point, that she was stagnating, that she needed to make some kind of change. That’s when her mother sent her that Facebook post that a framing business in Mentone was for sale.

“This was exactly what I needed,” she says. “I’ve been really happy with the change, because since I bought the shop, I’ve been able to buy myself a house. I got married.”

Unique Expertise

If you’ve ever had something custom framed, you might have wondered what’s involved and even raised your eyebrow a bit at the price.

“I look at it [as] when you get custom framing, it’s like a custom piece of furniture,” Rhea says. “A lot of it is the materials. That means acid-free materials. There’s a lot of chemistry that goes into that, whether it’s cloth or paper. If it’s cloth, is it cotton? Is it wool? Is it silk? Because if you have a protein-based cloth, you frame it completely differently than if you have plant-based cloth. Different substrate, different glazing. So not only are you paying for the materials, you’re paying for all that knowledge that comes along with it. I’ve learned a lot over the years. I’m still learning. I’ve taken courses with the PPFA (Professional Picture Framers Association). But I’m not offended if someone wants to bring me a frame from Amazon. The frame is really the least part of it. I have frames that are a couple dollars a foot, and I have frames that are $20 a foot. If you have the right frame for the piece and you bring it in, absolutely, I’m more interested in doing what’s right for the piece than making a sale. I may have to cut down the frame or put it back together if it’s not put together well, so there are some factors there. Or often someone will bring me something that can’t even go in a frame. It has to be in an acrylic display box or something, which I’m more than happy to do, but it’s not your typical framing job. Every job is unique.”

Framing is just one activity Rhea enjoys. Sewing is another hobby, mostly upholstery-type projects. “My husband, Josh, is a little annoyed that the sewing has taken over the house a bit, but he likes the stuff that I sew. He’s supportive.” She also enjoys going to the gym to work out and lift weights, something that started during COVID and that she and Josh do together. “I’m really bad at getting hobbies and not letting go of them,” she says.

Cloudland Framing is one of the vendors in Moon Lake Campus in Mentone. Rhea is in her shop Fridays and Saturdays, though you might catch her there on a Thursday. She is always available by phone at 256-634-0406.