About Us
Many of our loyal customers know the story of how, with all the exuberance of a 23 year old, I found a gallery for sale in the classifieds and bought it. As unbelievable as it seems to both Ron and me, Gallery 44 will celebrate our 34th birthday on May 1, 2006. On that first day of actual operation in 1974, Ron, then a mere fourteen year old, stopped by the store on his way home from school and left with a part time job.
We operated out of a 490 square foot store so small that we opted for a storeroom instead of a bathroom. Mostly we sold prints, ready made frames and knickknacks. All of our custom frame moldings fitted onto on 4 x 8 foot panel. Framing was much simpler then. In fact, if any of us sold a $3.00 a foot frame, we celebrated that "rich" person.
In 1981, we bought the Columbia Mall store. By this time, Ron now worked fulltime. After five years, we moved to a 1500 square foot store in the Bethany 40 Center in Ellicott City. Then in January of 2000, we moved to this wonderful location in the Valley Mede Center and doubled our showroom size.
Bill had worked for a local gallery that sent its traveling Asian art show all over the East Coast including to Gallery 44. When that Gallery folded in 1987, we got custody of Bill.
We now carry 3,000 moldings. We were honored by Larson-Juhl when chosen as one of only three galleries in the Maryland area to launch their new product line of hand-finished, gold leaf, Concerto moldings.
As always, we have exciting things planned both in store and on the web. We invite you to stop by and browse.
-Marian Berman