Re-Gilding Gurudeva in Gold!

It was in June, 2009, when the team from Michael Kramer's Gilding Studio came to Kauai to put the gold leaf on Iraivan. At that time they trained our members on how it was done. We also gilded the statue of Gurudeva at the same time. He has been sitting in Kadavul temple for 10 years. Flowers, malas, fingers touching his feet... all this gradually wore the gold leaf away. Kulapati Deva Seyon and Tandu Sivanathan having taken on the task of re-gilding him.

Here is at last Chitra puja, the day when the work began later that day.

Deva made a screened in cage to protect him from bugs, and he was moved to the Mango Mandapam for the operation.

You can see how the cage works. We lift it off, over his head.

You can see, he needs work.

Deva and Tandu are about to begin

The first job, is to apply the \"sizing\" which a special kind of varnish.

We him a good cleaning to start.

Next, the sizing goes on.

Then he was put back into his bug-free cage for the sizing to dry for a least 12-hours. After which it becomes a sticky base.

Today, gold leaf work begins. We had stored this gold leaf carefully for a decade.

Each piece is applied with special brushes.

It is almost finished. We let this layer dry hard. And tomorrow we do touch up of places that are to get to.

He is back in his cage for the night.

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