Fish silver - predecessor of the metallic paint finish
10/19/2012
While nowadays metallic paintwork is almost a standard feature and hardly anyone orders their Audi or Volkswagen in a solid color, things were different before the war. It was not until 1938 that the first metallic paints were developed, which roughly correspond to today's colors.
But even before that, there were paint finishes that shimmered. At Horch, for example, so-called "fish silver" was used, a paint finish to which fish scales were added. It goes without saying that a paint job of this kind could not have been cheap, as around 18,000 to 20,000 fish had to shed their scales for 0.5 kg of shiny silver.
If you want to see the result, we recommend a visit to the August Horch Museum. There is a Horch 853 Sport Cabriolet from 1936, which was painted using exactly this technique. Our recently published report also provides an insight into the museum, showing many other vehicles on display in addition to the Horch 853.
