Original paintings, sculpture, antiques, designer furniture, gallery installs, estate moves, auction-house consignments. Climate-controlled transport, custom-built crates, written condition reports, and white-glove install at delivery. Galleries, dealers, designers, auction houses, and private collectors book through ATI nationwide.
📞 Get Fine-Art Rate: (786) 574-5774 ✉ rates@ship-ati.comThree things separate art and fine furniture from everything else on the dock. First, the piece is irreplaceable — a damaged Rothko isn’t fixed with a new replacement from the warehouse. Second, the materials are sensitive to temperature, humidity, and vibration in ways that ordinary freight isn’t. Third, the value-to-weight ratio is extreme — a 30-pound canvas might be worth more than the entire trailer it’s riding in. Commodity freight processes don’t handle any of those well.
Museum and conservation standards specify a transport climate envelope of approximately 65 to 72 degrees Fahrenheit at 40 to 55 percent relative humidity. The reason is that wood, canvas, paper, and most paint binders all expand and contract with humidity. Rapid changes — the kind you get going from a 100-degree truck stop to a 65-degree gallery in 20 minutes — cause cracking in oil paint, warping in wood panels, and waviness in stretched canvas.
Climate-controlled freight maintains the envelope for the duration of the run and provides a continuous data log for delivery documentation. The log is part of what museum registrars and gallery condition checkers will want to see.
| Piece type | Recommended crating | Typical crate cost |
|---|---|---|
| Framed prints under glass | Cardboard art carton with foam corners | $40–$120 |
| Original painting <36 inches | Wood travel frame with glassine and foam | $180–$450 |
| Original painting 36–84 inches | Full wood crate, custom foam-out | $400–$900 |
| Large painting >84 inches | Reinforced wood crate, internal bracing | $700–$1,800 |
| Bronze sculpture | Custom wood crate, carved foam, hard-point bracing | $800–$2,500 |
| Marble or glass sculpture | Padded internal cradle, full crate, “FRAGILE THIS SIDE UP” | $1,200–$4,000 |
| Designer furniture (sectional, dining) | Blanket-wrap or split crate per piece | $200–$800 |
Climate · Crating · Condition reports · White-glove install
A condition report records the state of the piece at pickup and is reviewed at delivery. Specific notation language is what matters — “1.5 cm horizontal stress crack in paint film, lower-left quadrant, pre-existing” tells you something. “Looks fine” tells you nothing and is useless in a claim.
For pieces over roughly $50,000 in value, ATI recommends an art handler or independent registrar at both ends to perform the condition reporting. For lower-value pieces the carrier’s crew can perform the inspection using a structured template. Either way, every face, edge, and any prior repair is photographed and noted in writing.
Standard freight cargo coverage maxes out at limits that don’t reflect fine-art value. For pieces over $25,000 in declared value, ATI arranges supplemental fine-art transit insurance through a specialty broker. The policy follows nail-to-nail (from when the piece comes off the wall at origin until it’s on the wall at destination) with full-value coverage at declared appraisal amount. Premiums run roughly 0.3 to 1.5 percent of declared value depending on distance, mode, and prior loss history.
Documents you’ll provide for the insurance binder: a recent appraisal (within 3 years), provenance and ownership documentation, and high-resolution photographs. The insurer will request a condition report from pickup as a binder condition.
For art, white-glove install at the destination usually means wall hanging or pedestal placement. ATI’s art handlers locate studs, use appropriate fasteners for the piece weight, hang to a specified elevation (typically 57 inches from floor to center of work for residential, 60 inches for gallery), level, and verify against an installation plan if provided. Sculpture placement on pedestals or floors gets leveled, stabilized, and photographed in place. See the broader white-glove delivery services guide for the residential-installation scope.
For designer furniture, install means unpack, assembly per maker instructions, room placement to floor markings or designer’s plan, and final adjustment. Packaging removal and debris haul-away are standard.
Need to confirm NMFC class for the accompanying freight? Use the ATI freight class calculator.
ATI coordinates fine-art and designer-furniture freight nationwide on climate-controlled, air-ride capacity with custom crating and white-glove install. Galleries, auction houses, dealers, designers, and private collectors use ATI for single-piece moves through full estate relocations.
Call (786) 574-5774 or email rates@ship-ati.com.
Climate, crating, condition reports, white-glove install. Nationwide.
📞 (786) 574-5774 ✉ rates@ship-ati.com