Gold Lace. This term is applied in a general way to more than one kind of fabric made of thread covered with gilt silver wire. The 'gold wire' used in the manufacture of gold thread is nearly always in India, where a great deal is made, composed of pure silver with a thin coating of gold. But in European countries it is only the very best qualities of this wire which are made of unalloyed silver. A good quality of English gold thread is made from wire consisting of one part of copper added to twenty-five of silver, which is afterwards coated with gold. But alloys of copper and silver in many proportions are used, some wire containing only one part of silver to sixty of copper. The silver, or alloy of copper and silver, is made into a rod inch in diameter, and then annealed and polished to prepare it for its coating of gold. This is laid on in the form of leaves of pure gold, and subjected, for the best qualities of wire, to the fire-gilding process—i.e. the gold-coated rod is heated to redness on burning charcoal, which causes the leaf to adhere firmly. Rods so treated are next smeared with wax, and drawn through the holes of a steel drawplate (see WIRE, in Vol. X.). The wire is frequently annealed during the process of drawing, and this requires to be very skilfully done, or the golden tint of the surface is lost. Gold wire for thread is generally drawn down to a size measuring 1100 to 1400 yards to the ounce of metal. Finer sizes reach the length of 1800 to 2000 yards to the ounce, and to attain this fineness the wire is drawn through perforated gems, such as diamonds or rubies. The fine wire, after being annealed, is flattened between polished steel rollers. Finally the flat wire, or rather ribbon, is wound over yellow or orange coloured silk, so as completely to envelop it, by a spinning engine. The gold thread is then finished. Some of the best qualities of the metal covering or 'plate' of this thread have 12 dwt. of gold to the pound of silver or of alloy. Inferior kinds have as little as 2 dwt. to the pound, and still cheaper sorts of thread are covered with flattened copper wire which has received a thin coating of electro-deposited silver, and this afterwards receives, on the outside of the thread only, a still thinner electro-deposited coating of gold—two grains of the precious metal covering 3000 square inches of surface. For this very cheap kind of thread yellow cotton is used instead of silk.
The only difference between gold and silver thread is that the thin coating of gold is wanting on the latter. Gold thread is used in the manufacture of military lace, which is made in several patterns for officers of different ranks and for various divisions of the army and navy. This, however, is a woven substance and not true lace; but some real lace is made both of gold and silver thread. Both kinds of thread are also used for facings of liveries, and for ecclesiastical robes, altar cloths, and banners. These and other fabrics are either embroidered or woven, but often only in part, with the thread (see BROCADE, DAMASK, and EMBROIDERY). Much of the 'gold thread' used for theatrical dresses and decorations has only a covering of Dutch Metal (q.v.), and the 'silver thread' in these is spun with a covering of a cheap white alloy, having a mere film of silver on the surface.