ANTIQUE VINTAGE FLORENTINE (MANETTI) DUO GOLD FOR
WARTSKI OF ST. JAMES
Wartski St. James’s Gilded Signwriting
St. James’s and the Royal Jewellers Wartski.
CHOOSING the letters
The title was traced to remain faithful to the original brand with the subtitles married to the ‘Roman (Filetti) letter’ of our choice.
SHARPINGTON ROMAN LETTERING
We chose ‘William Sharpington Roman Alphabet’ mainly because I had worked alongside his lettering in the House of Lords some years earlier and they left such a lasting impression. This is always an important factor when we design even the simplest of projects – the power of the lettering in the viewer’s or client’s memory.
All lettering was hand drawn by pencil and paper, with close reference to William Sharpington’s distinctive London Roman alphabet shown below.
Sharpington’s work is of course notably classical, yet each letter was made from his own passion for calligraphic rendering. The structures are strongly reminiscent of the original Trajan (Roman) and Jensen (Venetian) inspirational characters.
There was for us then, after some discussion in the design studio, no more suitable letter form for this fine commission.
NGS Restoration Foundry Lettering
The line art layout above was refined by Seraina in our NGS restoration ‘foundry hand’.
This was drawn directly from the original, archive letters. This ‘pattern’ was then used as a guide for the hand painted lettering made on site.
Manetti Gold
After the lettering was completed the 24 carat, heavy gauge Manetti gold leaf was then laid in.
We used ‘3 Mani’ (coats/layers) and burnished to a mirror, inlaid ‘bevel’ finish.
Detail above: Florentine inline.
Florentine 2 tone gold
Florentine gilding is a 2 tone inline gild of satin and mirrored gold finishes, similar to Chicago gild. The main reason for this particular gilding system is that the brilliance of Florentine light made single tone gold too reflective in the glare.
This system was devised allowing the satin gold to remain visible in any light condition, while the mirrored slice adding sharpness and contrast in fluctuating light conditions.
Done right it always looks amazing.
London: TYPE Treasure hunting
We have a great Type App for free download:
Recently we also stumbled upon this panel below which bears strong relation to Sharpington. We can reliably attribute to him.
ALL OUR CREATIVE PROCESSES
Wartski was such an important commission and we decided to combine the four corners of our knowledge base: pencil drawing with technology for print-outs in order to form the final guides for the sable brush and gilded piece.
More ‘Case Histories’ of our NGS/Manetti gilding process to follow shortly.
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