Gilding is the fixing of gold leaf to a prepared surface and rubbing it into place. Gold leaf will not tarnish: it lasts for years, giving a true gold look to any wood, metal or plaster base. The lavish and decadent lives of yester year found the need to have almost every piece of furniture that they owned gilded, really evident in the 17th and 18th centuries across the globe. Today these fine pieces still have the same allure, but for totally different reasons - being antiques.
Old gold leaf antiques can be cleaned with water containing a few drops of ammonia. New gold leaf can be bought in plain sheets, or in transfers that have a tissue backing. The transfer sheets are much easier to use than the plain sheets. When applying gold leaf to a restored area, make sure that the surface is clean and dry. Paint the base with Japan gold size and leave it to get 'tacky'. Lay the sheets in place, slightly overlapping at the edges; rub them down carefully, following the direction of the overlap, with a clean cotton cloth until the edges blend evenly together. The knack is to lay the sheets on the surface when the size has reached the correct degree of 'tackiness'. If the size is too wet, the leaf crinkles; if it is too dry, the leaf will not stick.
Today the value of antiques will depend on whether pure gold leaf was used or wax gild, as was common practise to reduce the cost of making a fine piece of furniture. The other popular alternative, gold paint, although simple to apply, produces a rather garish finish and lacks depth. Wax gilts, available at most art shops these days, come in many tones of gold. They are ideal for touching-up damaged of gold leaf and for applying a broken gilt surface over white or coloured paint. They are simple to apply, ensuring that even most unskilful restorer can restore their prize antique piece. Wax guilt can easily be removed with turpentine substitute, so a good idea is to protect it with a covering of clear alcohol-based varnish. Another alternative is liquid leaf, again easy to apply. It can be brushed on, or drawn on with a pen. It is brighter than gold leaf and does not have the same 'antique' finish as wax guilt, hence larger areas may not have the desired effect especially when restoring your antique piece.
Ormolu is bronze, cast into decorative shapes that are gilded with gold leaf and attached to parts of furniture. A form of decoration that was developed from ormolu is brass alloy, with the same appearance as gold. The surface of ormolu often becomes tarnished because the brass sweats through the gilding. Clean it by brushing the surface gently with soap and warm water containing a few drops of ammonia. To remove any obstinate dirt from the surface, add more ammonia. Always wear rubber gloves for this work.
To restore faded or damaged antique pieces of painted furniture, scrape the paint down to the surface and fill any deep scratches or holes with plastic wood, or Polymer texturing paste. Rub the area with fine glass-paper and repaint, using matching artists' oil colours. To achieve a matt finish, only use undercoat paint; cover it when dry with a good-quality matt varnish. Small areas of old paint texture can be matched by using white undercoat as a base. Apply matching colours with artists' oil paint, which should always be a tone lighter than the original. When the paint dries, it should match the original tones. A varnish may be applied; however, it is best to varnish the entire area rather than the retouched area. This will give an overall even texture to your antique piece. New gloss may be a bit too shiny when dry; if so, rubbing it down gently with steel wool will give it that aged antique look.
With the spot market price for gold at record high prices, hobbyists are using interesting methods to find gold in areas that produced significant gold for gold detector machine for sale prospectors during the 49ers gold rush-and succeeding. They are using gold pans, dredges, high bankers and dry washers to find nuggets and dust in rivers, streams, steam banks and even desert areas.
The president of one major Internet gold buyer recently stated, "When we open a seller's property, we expect to find jewelry, coins and occasionally some small ingots. We have even received small vials containing gold flakes. However, when we opened two mailing envelopes from a seller in Northern California recently, we discovered a small plastic bag containing nearly three ounces of small to medium-sized natural gold nuggets. This was so unusual that we contacted the seller to ask where he found them.
While this seller wouldn't be specific about the location, he told us that most of these nuggets were found over the past ten months by prospecting with a metal detector in and around gold-bearing streams that had produced sizeable quantities of gold in the mid-1800s. Others were taken from deep cracks in rocks along stream beds where they were trapped when the streams were at flood stage and much, much higher. He added that this collection of nuggets represented many hours in the field and that he hated to sell his collection but needed the cash badly to prevent his car from being repossessed."
Apparently this is an interesting hobby that can really pay dividends with a little bit of luck!"
Most gold buyers want to purchase gold of any kind, even raw gold flakes and nuggets straight from Mother Nature. It makes no difference to these companies what form the gold is in or how old it is or where it originated. It all goes through the same process when received. It is assayed for purity and the price determined based on the spot market price at the time of receipt and how much pure gold is received. These companies buy rings, chains, watches, coins, ingots, scrap gold and yes, even nuggets and flakes mined by modern-day recreational prospectors.
One thing is virtually certain. As long as the market price for gold remains high, and global financial downturns continue, people will be looking for any possible way to come up with gold that they can sell for a fast cash turnaround.