How to hang a large tapa cloth

I recently got a large tapa cloth in Fiji and am looking for advice on the best way to hang it on a wall without damaging it.
Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

I used this method to hang my large tapa panel. The hand sewing was painful, but it works well.

As part of my mother-in-laws Christmas present last year my father-in-law got her tapa cloth framed for her, a monster six foot by six foot glass and wood frame, which thanks to the framers getting the quote wrong only cost £120, when he went to pick it up they told him the real price should have been over £300.
But i must say it looks really nice framed up.

hey, can you guys post pix of your Tapas? (mounted or not) ~ there are so many beautiful patterns .. oh and if you know the country of origin, that would be nice to know too.

i don't think there's beena Tapa Thread..

elicia

Im confused by all this talk of being correctly hung and getting mounted....

somebody help :)

[ Edited by: Chip and Andy 2009-06-05 17:37 ]

Has anyone else successfully framed a Tapa or hung one for display? My client wants to display his outside under a roof but still subjected to wind, heat, cold and humidity.

Check the link I posted above. That is how I did it and how conservators do it. Mine is going up on our screened in porch soon. Should be fine.

Maybe if it is outside it might also be good to spray it with Scotchguard....as it can help prevent it from retaining a stain from dust and such. I would avoid hanging in the light of the sun as any fabric will fade over time.

And just FYI, the tapa I hung this way is about 5 feet by 7 feet. A big piece.

If you frame it for outdoors or a lot of sun exposure get UV protectant glass of plexiglass.

We have a large tapa (about 12' x 6') hanging on our living room wall. We used a method pretty close to what C&A say above. I wasn't worried about losing the top few inches, so we wrapped it around a long rod and used spray adhesive to keep it on the rod. It hangs down basically like a tapestry would. Tapas are so light that you can get away with this method.

Herr's mine. From Fiji. 9 feet long and about 2 feet wide. I went the cheap way. Hung over a fake spear ( for now). Great design and color. Kept out of direct sun light and hung evenly. It looks just right in the mood lighting in my bar. The flash really kills the mood. Great post. A ton of great ideas out there. Thanks.

"Anyone who has ever seen them is thereafter haunted as if by a feverish dream" Karl Woermann

[ Edited by: uncle trav 2008-07-02 18:27 ]

Hey Swanky! Any chance you could repost a link to the method you used? I know this is an old thread and the link above seems to no longer be working. But I'd love to know how you did it. About to embark on this myself, and I don't want to do any harm to the piece.
Thanks so much!
Tara

Here is another similar article.

Here is the original. They moved it.

Lovely! Many thanks. Very helpful.

I always thought that this would be an easy way to hang tapa.

Attach the Bulldog Clips to the tapa and attach the clips to the wall. you can hide the clips with feathers, artificial flowers or some other objects.

Thanks, MaukaHale. That's a good idea.

I do something similar with my smaller Haitian drapeau. I use small binder clips and put tiny pieces of felt between the satin and the clip to prevent any damage to the fabric. But I've found that it doesn't work too well with the larger drapeau, as, even using multiple clips, I get too much sagging. But drapeau have layers of pretty heavy satin and a bunch of beads and sequins, which weigh them down a lot. So that may not pose a problem with the tapa.

For smaller pieces of tapa cloth magnetic stick pins will work, if you can find them. You don't need to poke a hole in the cloth in order to hang them.

Another good source is to look on this website. http://www.tapapacifica.com It's very informative.

Great resource. Thanks.

I hang my large drapeau using quilt hangers, which are strips of wood that screw together to clamp the fabric and do no damage to it. So I started googling to see what might be available in a more tiki-friendly design. Looks like Ten Thousand Villages has a bunch of these bamboo quilt hangers in different sizes that might work well:

http://www.tenthousandvillages.com/bamboo-textile-hanger-large

Thank you! Those are priced to sell. I think I'll buy some.

:) I might do the same. They are pretty cute and look like they'll do the trick.