Gilding Specialist

Gilding specialists apply ultra-thin gold, silver, aluminium, and other metal leaf to a wide range of substrates — picture frames, carved wood furniture, architectural mouldings, domes, lettering, mirrors, and decorative objects. The two principal techniques are water gilding and oil gilding. Water gilding — the most prestigious and technically demanding — involves applying multiple coats of gesso (chalk and rabbit-skin glue) to a wooden substrate, building up a smooth, hard ground; applying bole (coloured clay layers) that allow burnishing; laying gold leaf on a wetted surface, and burnishing the leaf to a high mirror finish using an agate burnisher. Oil gilding uses a gold size adhesive (slow-set, medium-set, or quick-dry) to lay leaf on a wider variety of surfaces, including glass, metal, and painted wood — it cannot be burnished but is more durable for external applications.

Conservation gilding involves analysing and matching original finishes on historic frames and architectural interiors, stripping failed gilding where necessary, and re-gilding using reversible materials in line with Icon or Historic England conservation principles. External architectural gilding — clock faces, weather vanes, dome finials — requires knowledge of weather-resistant oil techniques, specialist oil sizes, and often working at height. The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers and the Icon Paintings and Decorative Arts group support gilding conservation practitioners.

Historic gilded surfaces are present in almost every significant historic building and museum collection in Britain — ceilings, frames, furniture, architectural detail — and all require periodic conservation, restoration, and re-gilding as the leaf degrades over decades. National Lottery Heritage Fund conservation grants routinely fund gilding restoration in historic houses, churches, and public buildings. The technical distinction between conservation gilding and decorative trade gilding creates a professional hierarchy that protects skilled practitioners. New commissions — luxury interiors, bespoke furniture, architectural installation art — sustain a commercial market alongside the conservation sector. Gilding cannot be convincingly replicated by metallic paint or digital print for connoisseur clients.

Morning: apply the fourth coat of gesso to a set of picture frames, sanding back between each coat to achieve the required flat, pore-free surface for the subsequent bole layers. Afternoon: begin water gilding on a completed frame — apply three coats of red bole, allow to dry, cut and lay gold leaf sections using a gilder's tip, tap flat, and begin burnishing with an agate stone to bring up the reflective finish. End of day: visit a client's property to assess a 19th-century overmantle mirror for re-gilding — photograph the condition, take a small cross-section sample to identify the original ground and bole colours, and prepare a treatment proposal.