Old world craftsmanship such as the painstaking fold-leafing techniques dating back to the 13th century are all in a day’s work at Katayama Framing in Northwest Portland.

Behind the gallery in the bustling work shop, a team of artisans---using skills such as hand carving, designing linen and silk-wrapped mates, painting, and applying the delicate 22-karat gold leaf gilding---pampers and preens museum quality artworks to a framed perfection.

The meticulous attention to quality has paid steady dividends over the past decade. Sales have increased at around 12 percent annually and this year the business looks to top the $750,000 barrier. Marketing isn’t a problem---the shop has all the work it wants and 90 to 95 percent of the customers are repeats or referrals---but the business needs to expand.

The two principals, Marilyn Murdoch and Dennis Katayama, are currently negotiating to increase their working space from 5,000 to 15,000 square feet. They also plan to add a photography and conservation department---all before the years end.

Murdoch, the president, and Katayama, the vice-president, previously owned and operated separate businesses. She ran Framing Solutions, focusing on the wholesale end, while Katayama worked the retail side at Katayama Framing. In 1988, the two pooled their talents and resources under one roof at 2258 NW Raleigh with the goal of creating frames as beautiful as the art it holds.

According to Gordon Gilkey, curator of prints and drawings at the Portland Art Museum for the past two decades, they’ve succeeded. Katayama’s has framed 40 to 50 pieces for the museum, he says.

“We like working with them because they’ve got a top-notch crew. Besides having the widest variety of frames, they know how to handle artworks so they aren’t damages.”

The two partners meshed nicely, blending their different skills and temperaments. “I put out fires and handle the nuts and bolts stuff,” Murdoch says, “while Dennis takes care of long term planning and networking.”

Primarily devoted to classic designs in museum-style presentations, Katayama’s regular clients include The Portland Art Museum, Willamette University’s mark Sponenburgh antique art collection, and the University of Portland’s historic photo display and Presidents portrait gallery.

Besides art museums and private galleries, interior designers, architectural firms, and a wide range of collectors seeking to enhance their homes and businesses with art all knock on Katayama’s door. Although most clients art from the western states, the framer have customers in Asia, Hawaii, the Midwest, and Washington D.C.

Butters Gallery Ltd., one of the three largest galleries in Portland, is well known for bringing in art from outside the region and Katayama frames up to 20 pieces a month for them. Director Jeffrey Butters says Katayama’s constant research and product knowledge enables them to create the most solid and best designed frames he’s ever seen. “They have a great desire to put things together properly and they stand behind their products,” Butters says. “They frame entire art shows for us.”

Katayama, a board member of Oregon College of Arts and Crafts, began custom framing more than 25 years ago when there were only a handful of framers in Portland. (Today there are more than 100 in the metro area.) He traveled the West Coast extensively, checking out frame shops everywhere from Vancouver, BC to San Francisco. “I saw techniques and designs that were broadening for me. I self-taught myself just as an interest.”

His first love was the craftsmanship, because it is so hands-on. Then came an unquenchable thirst for a deeper understanding of the worlds of art and painting. He immersed himself in the Old World styles, pouring over obscure manuscripts and reading about French mats and gilding and learning which frames matched certain historical periods.

Like the very art it enhances and protects, picture frames are highly subjective, he says. “My personal view is that when we frame a piece of art, we’re giving it a place in time.”

When finished, a framed piece of art goes up on a wall in a person’s home, it should fit in with the surrounding environment, he says. “From 20 feet away a piece of art isn’t a piece of art---it’s an element on the wall. My plan is to put a piece of wood on it, a frame, a mat, glass, and so on, to embellish it, so that from 20 feet away it’s an integral part of the design of the room.”

But at five feet away, if the job is done right , it doesn’t matter how the painting is framed, he says. “If it’s a piece of art that’s worthy, you don’t even see the frame, you just see the art that’s inside.”

Most, but not all of Katayama’s customers purchase art from galleries and turn to them for assistance in acclimating the piece to its proper environment with reference to historical, cultural, and geographical perspective.

Whether it is a relatively uninformed consumer or a highly sophisticated collector, Katayama says it takes a special person to spend a large sum of money on a painting. “An ordinary person wouldn’t do that. I think when people spend that much money for a piece of art, it should be a statement about themselves as well as their environment.”