Eurofurence Information > Questions & Answers
Shipping Artwork Home - Possible Options?
VulpesRex:
Is there a DHL or UPS store within convenient distance of the Maritim Hotel?
One of the major things which I do at Furry Conventions is acquire art. Sometimes a lot. In the USA, I've either been able to drive to and from, with lots of space in my car for careful packing; or by carrying a large, bubble-pack filled, double-walled and reinforced cardboard shipping box, checked as baggage on domestic flights. That was (semi-) practical, when the airport was just a taxi- or shuttle-ride away from the convention site, and when I was just travelling between the convention city and my home.
But last year - despite my best efforts to pad and protectively wrap and pack my acquisitions in my large, dolly-wheeled soft-sided luggage, along with my clothes and other purchases - I suffered a major "FAIL". Everything survived the train trip to Suhl for the after-con "Ringberg Revival", and survived the train trip back to Frankfurt-am-Main, the stampede of strike-stranded LuftHansa travellers bundled off to the Steigenberger Hotel in Langen, and the shuttle trip the next morning back to the flughaven for the flight home; was still intact when I passed through Customs...only to have the glazing in Pan Hesekiel Shiroi's "Sacred Grounds" (remember the centerfold art from last year's Con Book?) fracture rather spectacularly, somewhere between Charlotte and Sacramento - probably in the process of "baggage handling". This resulted in glass shards throughout the luggage, and damage to TaniDaReal's 3-D "The Other Side".
Fortunately, no other artwork was damaged; the Tani piece was repaired with some cyanoacrylic ester, and after careful disassembly of the artwork "sandwich" in-place, "Sacred Grounds" was saved without gashes or gouges - but there are a few "sparkly" spots in the star field in the sky, which the artist hadn't intended, and I'm not about to try any more efforts to remove them, lest I cause actual detectable damage. As for myself, the cuts and punctures in my fingers healed up quickly.
...AND I intend to actually see some of Germany this trip - my father, who was based near Oberammargau in the mid-50's, keeps urging me to see the southern part of the nation, and I do wish to see Munich, and perhaps the resort town of Garmisch, or Lindau on Lake Constance the Bodensee; and any of this would be so much easier If I am not lugging a large, heavy suitcase full of fragile artwork, on and off trains across Germany.
Can anyone give advice or relate the experiences which they have had, shipping artwork to the USA?
Riox:
DHL offers a pickup service for a small extra fee. (4 Euro per 4 packages).
http://www.dhl.de/en/paket/information/privatkunden/abholung.html
DHL hands the packages over to USPS as far as I know.
---
Southern parts of Germany... our little Texas :)
Cairyn:
Hmm, this is an issue I had in the other direction - buying art at US conventions (and elsewhere) and getting it safely back to Germany. But I must admit I ultimately never sent it by mail - which is costly and potentially dangerous to the art, not to speak of the customs issues. I limited myself mostly to items I could actually put in my luggage. Small format matted originals fit into the side pocket of my pilot case (hand luggage), where they are quite safe. With one framed item, I had to take it out of the frame, discard the glass, and put the frame and the art into separate luggage pieces.
Fortunately I never had the money for anything really large...
Also, in the US I always had a rental, so hauling around a number of heavy luggage pieces was not that difficult. Using the train will make it a chore.
You can certainly send it by mail; properly packaged any sufficiently flexible item should survive. I can only point out the obvious... remove glass, disassemble large frames if possible, bolster with bubble wrap, keep it watertight, mark properly for customs, but that's self-explanatory. Postage may be expensive.
DHL/Deutsche Post: it's a major town so there are sufficient sales points around, at least open on Mondays:
http://standorte.deutschepost.de/Standortsuche?standorttyp=filialen_verkaufspunkte&ort=Magdeburg
Mystifur:
And of course
FedEx (no store, order online) and
UPS (store 2 miles away, or online)
will also be happy to sell you packing material, then pick up your stuff at the hotel and bring it to any place on the planet. (No
Their shipping cost is of course among the highest, but knowing Rex, he might put rank convenience over discount. :-)
Pan Hesekiel Shiroi:
Well, Cairyn already said it ... your best bet would be to remove the glass.
Also, you can get some acrylic glass/plexiglass at a do-it-yourself store (the employees will even cut it to the right measurements if you ask them) and use it to replace the real glass. It doesn't look as nice, but it's perfect for traveling and shipping: it's sturdier and lighter than normal glass. I myself always use it for shipping overseas. :)
Aside from that it doesn't make that much of a difference whether you ship it with a service or put it in your luggage - most airlines and shipping services don't treat their items carefully anyway. :/
(Oh, and thank you for purchasing Sacred Grounds, I'm glad to hear the original seems to be fine even though the glass broke.)
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