Golden Leaves- Genuine Gold, Brass, Oxidised Silver and Colourd Silver

Metallic leaves in golden colour… more than just genuine gold leaves!

There are “gold leaves” out there that do not contain any genuine gold. That sounds a little dodgy, but sometimes there are a lot of benefits in them in terms of handiness in production and application, and of course, they are more affordable!

One of the most major “fake gold leaves” is stamp-foiling. They are aluminum film coated with yellow pigment.

If genuine gold leaves were to be stamp-foiled… first of all they are too soft to go through the machine. And if we were to do it one by one by hand… price gets so high that no one can afford it.

Some other instances of alternative gold leaves include brass leaves for ryoshi- washi paper decorated for letters or cards or sliding doors, and coloured silver leaves for some of the traditional crafts including kimono. They have been traditionally used to best serve the purposes.

Below, we compared the iconic genuine gold leaves and three major alternative gold leaves.

name	Image	Compound	Featuresv	Usage
Gold Leaf 22.66K		Au:94.43% Ag: 4.90% Cu:0.66%	The genuine gold leaf that is frequently-used in Japan.	Paintings, Crafts, Religious art
Blue Brass Leaf		Cu:85.00% Zn:15％	The major alternative to gold leaf. It is more solid and hence easier to handle, yet the con is that colour changes over time.	Paper decoration, Flame, Paintings, Crafts
Oxidised Silver Leaf [gold]		Ag:99.99%	The very first process in silver sulphrisation appears gold. The process can be further advanced for different colours.	Textile, Tablet coat, Paintings, Crafts
Shinwa [gold]		Pigments or Dyes on Silver leaf	Silver leaves coloured with pigments and dyes.	Paintings, Crafts, Kimo

We tried gilding to compare the texture!

We hope you got to grasp the slight differences between the “gold leaves”...! As the price of gold soars these days, alternative leaves might be a way to go. Please make the most of the different features of each leaf! we hope you enjoy working with golden metallic leaves more than ever.

Product link is here

・Gold Leaf
・Other metal leaf-Brass leaf
・Oxidised Silver Leaf
・Shinwa-Coloured silver leaf