In this post I will show you exactly how to safely pack your acrylic paintings into a tube for shipping. Rolling acrylic paintings into a sturdy postal tube is a great way to make sure the painting wont get damaged during delivery, especially if you are shipping overseas. Rolling paintings into a tube is also a much more cost effective way to ship large paintings!
I have broken the process into step by step instructions below, but if you’d rather watch a quick video that explains exactly what to do, then you can watch it below!
I have packed and shipped lots and lots of my paintings using this method and every one has arrived safely with no damage at all. Once the customer receives the painting, they can take it to a framers to get it re-stretched and framed.
You will need:
- Acid free paper (I use glassine paper)
- Staple remover
- Bubble wrap
- Tape
- Packing tube (the length of the tube will need to be a bit longer than the width of your painting. The diameter of the tube will need to be wide enough to fit your painting rolled plus bubble wrap)
Step 1:
Lay the glassine paper onto a flat surface, then lay your painting face down onto the paper. Make sure the paper fully covers the whole painting, use more than one sheet if you need to, just make sure they are overlapping so there are no gaps.
Step 2:
Use a staple remover to remove all of the staples around your canvas. If your staples are really stubborn, you may need to use additional tools to remove them. You’ll see in the video that I had to use a few other methods to get these staples out! Make sure you are careful during this step as you don’t want to damage your painting.
Step 3:
Carefully remove the wooden frame of your canvas, leaving your acrylic painting below. Make sure all of the corners of the canvas are unfolded, and flatten the edges down as much as you can. The painting will now be flexible which will allow you to roll it to go into the tube!
Step 4:
If you are packing multiple acrylic paintings into the same tube and shipping them together, then you can just add another layer of glassine paper on top of your canvas and lay the other paintings face down on top of this. I am packing three acrylic paintings together to roll into my tube. If you are just packing one painting then you can skip this step.
Step 5:
Roll the painting up, making sure the painting is on the outer side. This helps to prevent the painting from cracking while it is rolled up (this is just for acrylic paintings, I haven’t packed oil or watercolour paintings using this method so I can’t advise on those!)
Roll the painting from the shorter side, as this will make the package shorter which means you can use a smaller tube.
Step 6:
Use painters tape or masking tape to fix the paper together. Make sure the tape doesn’t touch any of the canvas or your painting. It should just be taped onto the paper to hold the roll together.
Step 7:
Wrap your rolled acrylic painting in a sheet of bubble wrap. Make sure the bubbles are facing outwards, and the flat side of the bubble wrap is the side facing your painting. This prevents the bubbles from making any indentations on the canvas. Roll the painting in the bubble wrap until it is wide enough to have a snug fit it in the shipping tube.
Step 8:
Slide the rolled painting into your postal tube. It should be a snug fit so that the painting isn’t bouncing around during shipping. But it should also be easy enough for the customer to be able to pull it back out of the tube. Then, add the lid to the tube and tape it shut so that it is secure. I also like to add a few strips of ‘fragile’ tape to be extra carful.
Step 9:
To finish, just add your shipping labels to the tube and post it to your lucky customer!
It’s best to use a shipping company that has cover/insurance for paintings and make sure they also cover up to the value of the painting and not just the cost of the supplies!
I hope this post has been helpful! If you want to learn how to paint colourful animals you can sign up to my Patreon, where you will get instant access to all of my full length art tutorials!
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