Support: The support is a medium-weight, relatively open, coarsely-spun, basket weave, 2 x 2 linen or linen-jute blend over a typical, "American Style" double-bevel-faced, mortise-and-tenon, mitered-corner wood stretcher from Anco. Vertical and horizontal cross braces are in place with keys added and secured to those braces in 2007. There are also cardboard corner braces, tacked down, at each corner of the stretcher. The canvas exhibits minor cusping along the edges where the fabric was tacked to the stretcher.

Ground or Support Preparation: The artist or her assistant appears to have applied a dilute protein size, such as rabbit-skin glue or gelatin, followed by a priming of alternating layers of lead carbonate (PbCO3) in oil and zinc oxide (ZnO) in oil. UV-auto fluorescence photography suggests that the artist applied a priming of commercial basic lead carbonate 2PbCO3·Pb(OH)2 in oil and a commercial zinc oxide (ZnO) and barium sulfate, BaSO4, in oil. The priming appears to be applied in limited coats without sanding.

Design Layers: Graphite underdrawing is only occasionally visible at the margins of adjacent forms. The work is executed in single and double layers of stiff, paste-like paints, with multiple layers used at the brightest values. Overall, the paint application is fairly dry, leaving many areas of holidays visible. These should not be interpreted as losses, and this technique is common to the artist. Brush texture is generally retained in the stiff paints of brighter values. Cream, vehicular paints, nearly smooth and leveled, occur primarily in the darker values. There are frequent, linear, raised ridges of paint at the margins of forms. Scrubbing or zigzag brushwork has often been used in brighter values. The artist has executed gradual, stepped transitions in value or hue. In ultraviolet light, a bright, whitish-green fluorescence is visible on both the right and left edges, where the sky meets the mountain form, indicating the presence of zinc in the paint.

Surface Coating: An n-butyl isobutyl methacrylate copolymer resin was spray applied to the painting in a 1955 treatment.

Framing, Backing, and Hanging Hardware: The work is framed in a contemporary, micro-environmentally buffered, and gasketed metal-leaf "clam shell" profile frame, a reproduction of Georgia O'Keeffe's original design, created by herself and the framer/artist George Of. The glazing is Optium® tin salt-coated, UV-absorbing, static-free, non-reflective acrylic. The Optium glazing has a Volara closed-cell polyethylene gasket/pad. The frame is fitted with a laminated, Volara-gasketed backing strainer which has Security mirror-hanger and T-bolt hardware as well as D-rings.

All paints appear secure and stable, despite microscopic, intermittent, limited, and superficial cracking in the paints at the stretcher bar creases. As the artist applied stiff, matte paints, the canvas was deflected into the stretcher bars, resulting in microscopic fissures and creases in the canvas and priming layers. Over time, these fissures further evolved into intermittent, hairline cracks through the paint and as raised creases on the surface. There are also frame abrasions along all four edges of the painting face where the work historically rested against the rabbet of O'Keeffe's original frame, and these are also normally expected in O'Keeffe's works from this period. The paints in these edges are generally stable and secure, though there is some minor paint loss at the upper edge. A scratch that is approximately 1 ½" in length is visible at the upper left in the blue sky area near the branch tip that crosses the white cloud. There is a small gouge at the lower right. The work is now moderately taut. The paints are lightly soiled overall and particularly soiled at the top, bottom, and side margins from historic handling with soiled fingers and hands. There are a few surface abrasions visible in ultraviolet light. Also visible in ultraviolet light are two small, discrete areas of previous retouching at the right edge, between the two green bushes, and just above that, at the far right edge.