Gilding of Coat of Arms on exterior of Governor's Palace in Williamsburg, VA.

1. Governor’s Palace - 2000 Gilding of exterior wood-carved Coat of Arms Pictures are a little blurry because they are scanned images. The last slide is a professional photo copied from the internet.

2. Our little “house” that the carpenters framed in on top of scaffolding.

3. Phil…looks like he might have had a few last night. It had also snowed the night before. Thank God we had heaters in there!

4. Checking things out.

5. A lot of scraping, sanding, & cleaning to do before we can start applying the paint that the gold will stick to. It’s in pretty bad shape and needs some minor repairs.

6. Joe Camacho. He’s the sign painter that I replaced. I had a good year’s study under him before he retired. He was a lot of fun to work with…always in a good mood, no matter what the task ahead was.

8. The unicorn will be gilded with aluminum leaf. There is actually silver leaf but it, as all silver, tarnishes.

9. I discovered that a carpet knife worked best because of the way it curves. It was a painstaking process.

10. The best part of gilding is reading while the paint dries! Just have the dry floppy brush ready to tamp on the gold.

12. You have to constantly check the paint for the right amount of tack. The unicorn’s paint base is white for the aluminum gild. He still gets some gold accents though.

13. Tamping on the gold leaf.

16. Joe adds color to the crown.

18. The unveiling!

19. TADA! The finished product!