Framing memories or sports memorabilia? Collection Connection is your place

Updated 11/4/2023 3:00 AM

If you’re a sports fan of any consequence, stepping inside the “Collection Connection” show room near Bridgeport Village provides a rush of excitement and adrenaline.

Beautifully framed photos of greats from all sports, of all sizes and shapes, adorn the walls and fill the room. It’s sensory overload, if you will; something to be consumed like a very large meal, and not to be digested too quickly.

“When I first walked in, it was like, ‘Wow,’ ” says Frosty Comer, a long-time customer through his business, Cook Solutions Group. “The memorabilia they have on display is amazing.”

Production manager Rob Smith isn’t sure how many framing jobs they do a year, but it’s a high number, even though he now handles all the frames himself. He will do anything a customer wants framed, but he estimates that “about 85 percent of our framing now is sports-related.”

The business took a major hit with the tragic death of owner Kevin Stewart, who died a little more than a year ago in a motorcycle accident. He was 59.

“Kevin was one of a kind,” says sportscaster Adam Bjaranson, a frequent customer and close friend of Stewart. “I miss that guy. Think about him every day.”

“Collection Connection” has pushed on under Kevin’s widow, Cathy Stewart, who leaves the day-to-day operation of the business to Smith and her daughter, Leah Stewart.

“Leah and Rob are the rock stars here,” Cathy says. “He is our production guru and she is dealing with a lot of our corporate stuff, (with businesses) like Buffalo Wild Wings.”

Says Smith, with a smile: “I work for the ladies now.”

At 21, Leah is the acting CEO, handling the business after the death of her father.

“Before he passed, Dad got a lot of stuff that he said ‘wasn’t meant to survive, but it did,’ ” Leah says. “And it has endured, and so has our business. And that’s so cool and unique.”

Leah and Cathy Stewart, shown with an autographed photo of Jerome Kersey, are proprietors of “Collection Connection”

I’m happy to say “Collection Connection” is the newest supporting sponsor of kerryeggers.com. I’ll do my best to describe what the business is about in this piece, but you really need to visit the premises (16700 SW 72nd Ave, Portland) to get the full picture. If you have a sports item that you want framed, there’s no doubt it’s the place.

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Kevin Stewart grew up a collector. His parents owned a comic book shop on SW Barbur Boulevard in Portland. Kevin worked part-time in the shop and was into collectibles. In 1990, the Jackson High graduate was looking to expand to something besides comics. One day, he brought six baseball trading cards into a Beard’s frame shop, looking to display them in a 5 by 7 frame. Rob Smith was working the floor. They had never met.

“Kevin wanted to mat them with a double-mat, eighth-inch reveal,” Smith says. “I said, ‘Here is your frame; start putting it together and I’ll go cut your mat.’

“I came back in five minutes with it — it was perfect, because I was good at cutting mats by hand. He looked it over and said, ‘Damn, nobody else I’ve talked to could do it right then. You’re my framer.’ ’’

Smith had grown up in Houston but moved to Portland with his family when he was 17. He graduated from Cleveland High in 1985.

“I was studying to become a draftsman,” Smith says. “By the time I got through high school, I knew more than my teacher about drafting.”

In 1988, he quit his job at Pizza Hut and took off to Texas for the summer. When he returned, he saw a want ad in the Sellwood Bee and landed a job at Beard’s.

“My starting wage was more than I was making as an assistant manager at Pizza Hut,” Smith says.

“By my third day, I had already become their master mat-cutter. By the end of the first year, I became their first employee of the year.”

Stewart wanted to learn the framing business. Smith was the perfect teacher. He began showing Stewart the tricks of the trade. They were to become close friends over the years.

“Like brothers,” Smith says. “We fought like brothers and cared for each other like brothers. That’s the simplest way to put it.”

Smith began to teach Stewart how to frame. Soon Kevin had incorporated it into the business on Barbur.

“Kevin was into collectibles and wanted a way to preserve memorabilia while being able to showcase it,” Cathy says. “He learned through Rob how to preserve and frame.”

“Kevin wanted to do sports in his comic book shop,” says Smith, who began to work part-time there. “He wanted to mix. We were framing some comic book art and some sports stuff. After about a year and a half of doing that with him, I told him, ‘We need to figure out how to do jerseys at a decent price, because no frame shop here in town can do them right.’

“Within six months of trial and error, we figured out our system. That’s what blew the place up in ’91 or ’92. We figured it out, and then it was, ‘This is how we do it.’ ”

Stewart took over the business from his parents in 1993 and had turned it into mostly a frame shop by 2000.

By that time, Smith had become a business partner. They moved the shop to Beaverton and began specializing in framing sports memorabilia.

“The word slowly got out that we were framing jerseys,” Smith says. “We had an in with the U of O, because Kevin’s cousin worked in their Portland office. We started doing their senior jerseys and stuff with their auctions.”

“Collection Connection” began working with Portland-area high schools framing sports items. Oregon State became a client in 2006 after claiming the College World Series championship.

“That’s when things really started to explode,” Smith says. “We got the Trail Blazers and Timbers, and we now have the Winterhawks.”

Production manager Rob Smith (left) goes over an order with Greg Sampson, director of hockey operations of the Winterhawks

Kevin and Cathy were married in 1998. Soon after the wedding, she realized he had another love besides his wife.

Cathy and Kevin Stewart (courtesy Cathy Stewart)

“His nickname in collectibles was ‘Noah,’ ” she says. “He had to have at least two of everything. After his passing, I’d go through his stuff and find he had like 30 of the same (trading) card.”

“Collection Connection” moved to its current location in 2015, a warehouse that has a large work room and a show room. It also had Stewart’s “brag room,” a personal archives room where he stored his large collection of memorabilia. “A lot of it is autographed, and some of it is personalized,” Cathy says.

In particular, he cherished Hall of Fame outfielders.

“He loved (Roberto) Clemente, (Willie) Mays and (Hank) Aaron,” Cathy says. “Those were his three favorite guys.”

I’ve toured the “brag room” a couple of times. It would take a few hours to look at everything. There is a staggering amount of good stuff, and a lot of it is state of Oregon-centric — the state’s sports history in one spot.

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Years ago, Adam Bjaranson had started collecting sports jerseys and wanted them framed. He visited “Collection Connection” and was hooked.

“Kevin and I gravitated toward each other,” Bjaranson says. “Such an approachable guy. I would only go into his shop if I knew I had at least two hours to burn. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t go, because we’d sit and talk about people and the industry and sports.

“It was like he was my big brother. He was one of those larger than life guys. He knew a little about everything. I was a sponge every time I’d go in there and see him. He was one of those people in our lives that I thought would live forever.”

Says Smith: “Kevin was big, and his personality was big.”

“Dad was larger than life,” Leah says. “Always had a story. You’d tell him about something and he’d say, ‘Oh, I got a guy for that.’ Or somebody would bring in a cool magazine and he’d go in his private room, pull something out of a file cabinet and say, ‘Here are three of them — all signed.’ ”

Kevin formed personal relationships with his customers.

“With framing, he loved telling a story,” Cathy says. “If student-athletes came in with a project, he’d do what he could to help them tell the whole story of the piece. He would say, ‘I don’t care what people will bring in; I’ll frame anything.’ He loved what it represented to the person who wanted to preserve it.”

Kevin typically had ideas to help the project have its best look.

“A lot of times the customer would have to go home and get more pieces to go with it — a ticket stub or something to bring it all together,” Cathy says. “He loved when people came in and said he had given them so many ideas, ‘they left with their head spinning.’ ”

Comer began coming to “Collection Connection” about 10 years ago, primarily to get jerseys framed for display at Cook Solutions Group’s corporate office near Portland International Airport. Among them: Ronnie Lott, Marcus Mariota, Terry Baker, James and Jacquizz Rodgers.

“I’ve watched both Rob and Kevin do framing in their production area,” Comer says. “It’s like an artist at work. They do it so fast, and it comes out so perfect. They have that way of adding a professional touch.

“Kevin had a passion for his business beyond what you’d think. What separated him from everybody else in the industry? He made sure everybody was satisfied. He went above and beyond the expectations.”

“It was always a good day in here when someone brought in something unique,” Leah says. “Before he died, a lot of people had been bringing in war memorabilia from their grandparents. They wanted to tell the story of their ancestor. That really resonated with Dad. He loved being able to preserve the legacy.”

“Collection Connection” may not have had a better customer than Bjaranson through the years.

“I have north of 50 pieces they have framed,” Bjaranson says. Some of them are displayed at the KOIN sports department office in downtown Portland, including one featuring Bill Schonely and another a signed jersey of Dan Fouts.

“When I was a kid in the early to mid-1980s, I would write to players for their autographs,” he says. “I would buy a signed jersey, include the autograph I already had and have it framed. I have an entire folder on my phone of the things I’ve had done. We’re running out of wall space at my home.”

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Kevin’s shocking death gave his widow pause. What should she do?

“Mom panicked and wanted to sell,” Leah says. “I was like, ‘Hold up, we can’t do that.’    The business was so big, it was easier to keep the ball rolling than to try to stop the ball.”

“When someone close passes like that, you get in a fog,” Cathy says. “But once we talked about it, I realized that with what was going on with the business, it needed to keep going.”

The future may lie in the hands of Leah, who first worked at the shop while in high school and immediately made herself indispensable.

“After Leah graduated, she would hang out and help Kevin,” Cathy says. “She apprenticed under him, and learned. Sometimes it’s easier for the youngsters to work the computer and do the spreadsheets and the layouts. He would sometimes be lost and not so efficient. She came in and installed systems. When he passed, those systems were in place and she could pick up and keep it going.”

After graduating from Tualatin High, Leah attended Portland Community College, earning an associate’s degree in business management and a one-year certificate in business marketing.

“I always knew I wanted to go into business and entrepreneurship,” she says. “I knew I wanted to take over the business. I just didn’t expect it to be this soon.

“There were some stumbling blocks in the beginning, but between me and Rob, we had just enough knowledge to be dangerous. We’ve been able to come together and figure out the stuff that only Dad knew.

We got through our corporate remodel season this summer without completely losing it. We have a pretty good handle on things, I think.”

One of the primary corporate sponsors is Buffalo Wild Wings, a client for more than a decade.

“We have done framing for 20 to 25 of their stores, all throughout the country, just this year,” Leah says. “Over a decade of partnership, we have done hundreds of stores for them. That’s a market that will always be there for us. We’ve also cultivated a lot of other business relationships through the years.”

“Collection Connection” services a large number of high school and college athletic teams in the region.

“One of Dad’s big passions was high school and college sports,” Leah says. “Being able to do their senior awards and to recognize athletes was special to him. He loved connecting and networking with those people.”

Kevin left a rich legacy in terms of quality of preservation of framed items.

“We preserve the jerseys that are brought into us,” Leah says. “Customer will come in with an item they  want us to reframe. We’ll take it apart and the jersey will be destroyed. We’ll get a high-quality autographed jersey that should be worth lots of money, but you go to frame it and it’s been cut in half.

“Everything we frame here, if you take it out of the frame, you’ll never know it was framed. That’s the high quality of preservation we commit ourselves to here.”

Adds Cathy: “Instead of framing just the magazine cover, we’ll put in the whole magazine. You take it out, it doesn’t lose any value.”

Also, Leah says, “We frame a lot of historical stuff that would otherwise be tossed. It’s neat to see things that are unique and vintage come through our shop.”

“Collection Connection” stages occasional athlete appearance events in its show room. Former Oregon receiver/return specialist De’Anthony Thomas was featured in one this summer. The company also participates in events featuring athletes at other vicinities.

Some of the merchandise and memorabilia “Collection Connection” has in its inventory is for sale. If you’re looking for an interesting piece of sports history to showcase in your den, this is your spot to start your search. And if there are items you need framed, Rob Smith will turn it over “in a week or two.”

“We’ll do what we can to meet your needs,” Smith says. “And we’ll do it better than anyone else.”

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