Hi! Thanks for visiting the site. Today, I talk about polishing gold lines by Marufun(丸紛).
This is the mug that I’ve been working on for a while. Here, I already, attached the handle with Mugi Urushi(麦漆), painted a few layers of Sabi(錆漆) and Urushi(漆), then put gold powders(金粉), and painted a extremely thin layer of Urushi.
Now, it is time to finish polishing the gold line.
In fact, I painted a layer of Urushi a way TOO THICK on top of the gold powders. Thererfore I needed to redo the process.
Before polishing the gold line with a stone stick, I needed to first polish the top urushi layer with stone powders to remove them a bit. Here again, I polished a way TOO HARD, and ended up havning removed everything including the gold underneith!
Here are the tips
- The layer of Urushi on top of the gold powder must be very very very thin (invisible).
- Polishing this top Urushi layer must be really really really little by little (almost unnecessary).
Other keys
- I used Marufun(丸紛) this time. This type of gold powder is round shaped and thicker than the other types of powders such as Keshifun(消粉), and requres the top Urushi layer and additional polishing process. It is said that Marufun lasts longer than Keshifun.
- I used several stone powders, called Ishiko (石粉) and Tonoko (砥粉) mixed with common vegetable oil (which is in my kitchen) to polish the top layer of Urushi. I use my finger to polish this.
- I used a thin stone stick (メノウ棒) to polish the gold line. I feel that this stick is too thick, and not pointy enough to reach where I want.
- I used a special brush called Kebou (毛棒) to spread the gold powder over Urushi. I found it VERY GOOD! I prefer to use this brush than the silk balls called Mawata(真綿). I use the smallest one.
Note :This button above is just a simple link for info purpose, and no ads, no commission, no affiliate or nothing of these kinds.
- I placed an oven paper, (yes, the one that you use when you bake a cake, yes you use a specialWashi paper for this purpose normally, but you know that I don’t have them, and yes at least it is better than a copy paper) under the mug when I spread the gold powder, so that I can collect them afterwards. I folded into four beforehand.
I hope you find this info useful.
Happy Kintsuging!
Atelier Emika 