The genuine silver leaf needs four kinds of special tools to be applied:
1) Leather cushion, to set the whole silver leaf;
2) Gilding knife, to cut small squares of leaf, avoiding any waste;
3) Squirrel’s tip, that can catch the leaf by electrostatic charging;
4) Agate stones, that one day after the application are needed to burnish the leaf.

To get a very smooth base surface, gilders traditionally used natural glues mixed with chalk. 7- 8 layers of this mixture, with increasing quantities of chalk from the first towards the eighth, were spread over the surface.

Each layer needs about 24hrs to dry-up.

At the top, the last coat is bole (yellow, red or black), a particular clay that is naturally sticky when dry. The color of bole is necessary to enhance the shining of the silver leaf: black for standard silver decoration, yellow or red for patina-finished silver.