Years back I started framing and mounting some of my favorite album covers and although they look great on the wall, there were several issues I had to contend with.

If I had decided to mount the whole LP, the record and inner sleeve included, I would not able to play it regularly because to do so I’d need to take it off the wall and open up the frame to access the LP. And if I choose to make the frame lighter by not including the actual record and inner sleeve, I risked exposing the later to dust, fingerprints and general wear and tear.

What I ended up doing was buying used copies of my album to mount, to simply use the cover and disregards the rest. But this is of course not an environmentally friendly option in the long run. And I could have probably protected my exposed records more in a heavy duty carrying case.

Oh well. Live and learn.

Album collectors today of course have access to better options like the Snap Show and Use Vinyl Record Frame, the Art Vinyl Play and Display Record Frame, the Records on Walls slide in frame, the 12 Inch Art LP mounting kits and this new British Kickstarter crowdfunding project called Record Roots.

With Record Roots one can also easily remove and replace LPs, displaying eight albums at once. And the frame is modular so additional eight album modules can be added to each other.

Like the Art Vinyl Play and Display Record Frame and the Records on Walls slide in frame these hold double LPs. But it appears that the Art Vinyl Play and Display Record Frame is better for triple LPs.

Had I started mounting my favorite albums today I would have probably chosen to use the Record Roots system because I don’t have any double and triple LPs. I had sold those to upgrade to compact disc, back in the day, and my very favorite albums are single LPs anyway.

In case you’re curious, some of my favorite album art features paintings like Live’s “Throwing Copper“, Fleetwood Mac “Tango In The Night“, Queen’s “News of the World“, Heart’s “Dog & Butterfly” and Talk Talk’s “Natural History“.

I am also quite fond of Pink Floyd’s “Division Bell” and “Tree of Half Life“, as well as Def Leppard’s “Pyromania“, “Adrenalize” and “Retro-Active” cover art.

Those are of course the only ones I can think of, off the top of my head. And I managed to find album sized posters and promo posters for most of the above mentioned but I have just so much wall space. 🙂

By the way, if you’re a fan of album cover art you might like “Album Cover Album” by Roger Dean, “The Greatest Album Covers of All Times” by Barry Miles and “1000 Record Covers” by Michael Ochs.