framing

Pluralframings (some meanings)

1. 1
   noununcountable

   The act of placing a picture, photograph, or similar item into a frame.

   Professional framing protects artwork from dust and sunlight.

   The gallery handled the framing of every print before the exhibition.

   Similarmounting

   Note

   Beyond the act of mounting, the word also names what surrounds the picture. Wooden framing and steel framing describe the material of the frame itself, and in that use the word is uncountable. Steel framing turns up in the building sense as well, so the surrounding words decide whether a gallery or a construction site is meant.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The structural framework of a building, or the work of constructing that framework.

   The crew completed the framing before the roof went on.

   Steel framing gives tall towers much of their strength.

   Similarframework, skeleton, structure, carcass

3. 3
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The placement of an issue or idea within a particular context, shaping how it is understood.

   The framing of the debate as a safety issue swayed undecided voters.

   Journalists shape public opinion through the framing of a story.

   Similarpresentation, portrayal, characterization, spin, slant

4. 4
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of frame.

   She is framing the discussion around shared goals.

   Carpenters spent the morning framing the second floor.

   Note

   The -ing form carries every sense of the verb. These range from fitting and composing a plan to putting up a building's structure or setting a picture in a border. As a gerund it still takes a direct object (framing the second floor). Once it takes of instead, as in the framing of the photograph, it has become a noun like the picture-mounting sense, and only then can it be pluralized as framings.

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