Fine Art & Framing Gallery Named One of America's Top 100

Fine Art and Framing Gallery at 220 Front Street was recently named by Décor Magazine as one of America’s top 100 Art and Framing Retailers for 2006. The annual award is sponsored by the magazine and TruVue and is announced each year at the Atlanta Expo.

The winners, which are selected by a panel of judges, are judged based on sales growth, store design, marketing, profitability and technology integration.

“I feel proud and honored to have received this award, especially considering that there are over 24500 art and framing galleries in the United States,” said owner Karen Van Camp. “It is hard to believe that we will celebrate our 15^th year in this business in April.”

Fine Art and Framing Gallery opened in Parkersburg, WV in 1992 in a little 250-square-foot shop on Sixth Street . They grew that year and in 1993 moved into a large Parkersburg shop on Green Street. The gallery in Marietta was added in 1999 and another one in Dresden, Ohio in 2000. When the Parkersburg location closed in 2002, a Charleston, West Virginia store opened at Charleston Town Center Mall.

“We offer a complete line of custom, conservation framing designed to enhance and preserve your art,” Van Camp said. “Our staff consists of three designers and two production specialists, in addition to my husband, Glenn Newman. With his over 20 years’ experience in the printing and publishing industry, he is able to restore old or damaged photographs and prints and can reprint them up to 48 inches wide on our giclee printer, using archival, stable inks.”

“We have learned a tremendous amount about printing, framing and art in our 15 years in the business. We are also proud of the list of artists’ work that we carry, and each year we have at least two nationally-known artists make an appearance in the store,” she said.

The gallery carries work by over forty artists, including several local talents. Some of their top-selling ones are Thomas Kinkade, Rod Chase, G. Harvey, Simon Bull, Michael Dickinson, Paul Prachun and Thomas Stahl. They are open Monday through Saturday from 10 AM to 6 PM, with extended hours during summer and holiday seasons.