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Portrait of a framer

Lou Piniella's wife and a Hyde Park artist go to George. So do ballerinas with odd requests. Why? The custom framer is candid, attentive and talented.

By SHERYL KAY
Published March 4, 2005

CARROLLWOOD - It's a strange combination of a soulful Nirvana tune, slightly masked by the morning's local TV news report of a fishing adventure, all coming together behind the incredible pounding of a machine's compressor.

Just another day's cacophony coming from the Frame Place and Gallery at 11735 N Dale Mabry Highway, and owner George Tavrides says he doesn't hear a thing.

"I tune it all out, just concentrate on what I'm doing," said Tavrides, 49, who is celebrating his 20th year as a custom framer in north Tampa. "It's harmony in disharmony, and I just hear the noise in my head saying that I've got to keep working."

It's not altogether that different than the sound that drove him two decades ago when he turned a part-time job into a lifetime career.

"The first three or four years I took a note out on my house to get this place going, and I had to pay off about $20,000," Tavrides recalled. "It scared the bejohnnies out of me - they could have taken my house away."

Smell the sizzling trout in the toaster oven. It's his own fresh catch, scooped up from the Gulf of Mexico on days when Tavrides, quite frankly, just didn't feel like working.

"Anything that can be framed, I can frame it," he said, noting that he represents dozens of molding manufacturers, and has about 1,000 samples.

Tavrides' customers have turned to him for the traditional framing of family portraits, certificates and diplomas, and artwork that, on occasion, has been produced by world-renowned artists including Marc Chagall and Salvador Dali.

Some items have been a tad more eclectic.

"I once had this ballerina come in, and she unwraps this little tissue, and she's got her toenail in it," Tavrides said. "She told me how the nail got ripped off while she was dancing and how it was bleeding all over and that she just kept dancing. She said she was so proud that she just kept on dancing, and she wanted to remember the agony forever."

Tavrides said he never cracked a smile, looked over the nail and recommended a small suede-lined shadow box.

"Actually, it was kind of cute, and the framing came out great," he said.

A more typical application of Tavrides' custom-built shadow boxes is for athletes showcasing their jerseys, photos and awards. He counts Tampa Bay Buccaneer Joe Jurevicius, the Lightning's Nolan Pratt and the Yankees' Jorge Posada among his clientele.

"When I have things I want done properly, I go to George," said Anita Piniella, 61, of Avila, the wife of Devil Rays manager Lou Piniella. "He's really good at helping me select mats or frames. He just gives you that personal touch.

"And he's honest when he tells you something - he tells you in a way you can accept it and not be insulted."

Artist John Canning has worked with Tavrides for 12 years.

"Anything I have to be framed, from reproductions to originals, it all goes to George," said Canning, 38, of Hyde Park, whose tropical and romantic realism paintings and drawings often retail in the thousands of dollars. "His building is so sound, so archivable, so environmentally safe, there's no match for it in this area."

Like Piniella, Canning has also come to appreciate Tavrides' unique personality and the individual attention he receives.

"He's blunt about how it looks and what he frames," Canning said. "He's a character in his own right, and he says it like it is. He's not trying to impress or be something he's not."

Tavrides is the first to admit he'd rather send a customer away than try to frame something the wrong way.

"Sometimes I can't do what you want to do, and I don't feel I should put my name on the product if I didn't do it right," he said. "If someone comes in with an 1847 map, it should be archival framed and I'm going to recommend museum-quality glass even if you decide to frame it with $4.99-a-foot molding. That's the right glass to use and that's what I'm going to tell you."

Being the sole proprietor has other benefits aside from the ability to choose which framing projects to undertake. An avid fisherman, Tavrides has been known to occasionally tack a note on a napkin to his shop's front door:

Gone Fishing.

On those days you'll find Tavrides on his 18-foot Action Craft wading in the waters just off Fort De Soto Park in Pinellas County, searching for snook, reds, trout and flounder.

"It's possible that on any given day, especially Sunday or Monday, if it's pretty out, I'm definitely not here," he said. "I really do try to concentrate on framing eight months out of the year, and then I try to fish the rest of the time."

Even on the boat, though, Tavrides never leaves his business far behind, forwarding the store's phone to his cell phone.

"People are framing things that have significance, things that bring back memories, that evoke all these feelings, and the frame is so important," he said. "You can take a fabulous piece of art, put a horrible frame on it and destroy it, but you can put a really nice frame on it and you can make it look terrific, and that makes people feel good."

Contact reporter Sheryl Kay at skreporter@hotmail.com

[Last modified March 3, 2005, 09:12:11]