Can You Hang Canvas Prints in a Bathroom?

by William Kenny

Can you hang canvas prints in a bathroom – or in other humid locations? We investigate whether bathroom canvas prints are a good idea.

The short answer?

Yes, you can. Canvas prints will look fantastic in any room where they’re displayed. The sharp definition and rich colours will be just as stunning, and the mixture of traditional workmanship and cutting-edge technology will be just as convincing.

The longer answer?

Yes, you can, but bear in mind that canvas is a fabric. Placing a fabric material in a humid environment calls for a touch more thought and care than putting it in the living room or study.

Here’s what you need to think about before buying a photo canvas to match your new bathroom suite...

In this article:

• Why Canvas Prints are Vulnerable to Moisture

• The Potential Issues

• The Protection MYPICTURE Prints Give You

• Whether to Hang Your Print in a Bathroom

• Whether to Hang Your Print in Other Humid Places

“What makes canvas prints vulnerable to moisture?”

Canvas is a fabric, and fabrics are by their nature absorbent. This explains why canvas prints achieve such saturated colours – they can absorb large quantities of ink, giving you the colour richness that makes for such beautiful print reproduction.

The issue is that canvas stays absorbent. This means that it’s prone to soak up moisture from the surrounding air as well.

If you’re taking baths and showers in an enclosed space then steam will build up, and some of this moisture could start to seep into the fabric surface of your print.

“So what can go wrong?”

If your bathroom canvas print has no anti-moisture protection, you could be looking at three potential problems down the line:

• Mildew: Any fabric that’s often damp will be a tempting home for the pesky fungus that we all know and don’t particularly love.

• Warping: The process of getting damp and then drying out, time and time again, can start to weaken the fibres of the canvas material. This can lead to the fabric warping – and over the years a tautly wrapped canvas can gradually become slack.

• Print dissolution: If a canvas is printed with water-based inks, moisture can begin to dissolve the print reproduction, making lines less sharp and colours less distinct.

Note: we said IF your canvas has no anti-moisture protection. Thankfully, that doesn’t apply to prints from MYPICTURE. Here's why...

“How are MYPICTURE canvas prints protected against moisture damage?”

Part of the appeal of canvas prints is their traditional, tactile design. The subtly textured fabric is deliberately left exposed. In principle we could shield our prints with a glass cover, but we think that would defeat the whole object.

So we developed other ways to protect your print from the damp:

• Special coating:The surface of each print is treated with a protective coating that limits how much moisture the fabric will absorb – creating an excellent shield against mildew and reducing the risk of moisture damage to a minimum.

• HP Latex Inks: Our inks are latex-based, not water-based. State-of-the-art latex inks from HP have all the chemical stability of solvent-based inks (but without the allergenic and ecological drawbacks). That means they stay ultra-crisp when their water-based equivalents are starting to dissolve.

• Extra-tough canvas:We’ve fortified our canvas material over years and it’s stronger than ever, offering superb resistance to moisture-induced warping.

It’s a three-line defence system that gives your prints as much protection as today’s technology allows.

“So, should I hang a canvas print in my bathroom?”

If you’re buying your bathroom canvas prints from a reputable seller like MYPICTURE, and unless your bathroom is going to be in use for hours on end every day, then they should take the extra moisture in their stride.

Our canvas prints are about as tough and durable as fabric prints can get. They’re built to last – even in a humid environment like a bathroom.

Buy a canvas from MYPICTURE and you can expect it to be colourfast for at least 75 years. And for those 75 years the protective coating will shield the HP latex inks from mildew and ink dissolution – in all but the wettest wetrooms.

There’s just one proviso: no canvas fabric will be completely impervious to the slight loosening that’s caused when the material gets damp and then dries out. We can’t guarantee that after a lifetime of service your canvas will still be as perfectly firm and taut as it was on the day it arrived.

“What about humid environments other than bathrooms?”

There’s humid and then there’s humid. You’ll need to judge for yourself how often your print will be exposed to moisture, and to what degree. This calls for a bit of common sense. But if you’re thinking of buying a MYPICTURE print, we’re sure you’ve got a good head on your shoulders.

Use the bathroom of an average family home as a benchmark. Will your print be exposed to significantly more moisture than it would in that bathroom? If so, we’d advise against hanging your print there if longevity is important to you.

Some brief advice about a few specific settings:

Kitchen

The kitchen of an average family home? No problem. You can cook three square meals a day and your canvas will easily handle the volume of steam produced.

The kitchen of a thriving restaurant? It’s probably best to leave those white tiles bare.

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Shed or Garage

Canvas will hold up well in any dry, well-constructed outbuilding. But if you wouldn’t put a bookshelf in your draughty shed/garage for fear of mildew, hanging a canvas is a no-no.

External Walls

Avoid hanging your canvas outside, even in covered areas. There’s simply no region of the UK where the climate will be forgiving to the canvas material!