The basic ingredient of glass is silica, or small crystals of quartz sand. To form glass, silica is mixed with soda or potash and lime. Soda (a material from burnt seaweed) and potash (a material from wood ash) alter the melting point of silica, while lime is used to strengthen the material. When melted, glass can be moulded into different shapes, and hardens once it cools. It can be made into different colours depending on what materials it’s mixed with. Glass beads have been around for thousands of years, apparently they invented by the Egyptians over 3500 years ago!
Plastic is a blanket term applied to a group of synthetic chemical products that can be molded, carved, laminated or pressed into many shapes, sizes and designs. The first types were used to immitate naturally occuring materials like tortoise, horn, mother-of-pearl, marble, amber, etc.
“Early plastic” jewellery, particularly from the art deco period (1925-1940), is highly collectible today. Back then, plastic jewellery was seen as a new art form in itself, not as reproductions of earlier/fancier jewellery. Plastic started being used by fashion designers in the twenties and thirties, and “false” jewellery (costume jewellery) became acceptable even in higher social circles. From 1940, plastic became widely popular as WWII led to a shortage of metals. I’ve outlined some of the types of early plastics used in jewellery below:
Celluloid
A type of early plastic, made with cellulose, which is found in green plants. It was trademarked in 1868 in the US, and was initially used in the production of billiard balls. For jewellery, celluloid was commonly used to immitate ivory, bone, or tortoiseshell. As it was highly flammable, other plastics replaced it throughout the years - being highly flammable isn’t such a problem with jewellery (pretty much all common clothing fabrics are), but plastics were used in other industries where catching on fire easily and conducting electricity weren’t desirable. For example, one of celluloid’s uses was to make photographic film, which is why we always see film catch fire in old-timey movies like Inglourious Basterds!
Galalith
Another type of early plastic, Galalith was patented in 1898 in Germany. It was fast and inexpensive to produce, and could be cut, drilled, embossed and dyed in any way without difficulty. It’s made from casein, found in milk! This also explains why it stopped being produce in the 1940s, as milk couldn’t be wasted during WWII.
Bakelite
Trademarked in 1909 in Belgium, Bakelite was an innovative form of plastic (the first one made completely synthetically!), and was a better alternative to celluloid and other previous plastics, which as you now know were highly flammable and conducted electricity. Bakelite is also more durable and has a sleeker finish than celluloid, so it was highly favoured for jewellery. It stopped being produced in the 1950s in favour of cheaper alternatives, which is why it’s so expensive today.
Lucite
Lucite was trademarked in the US in 1937 and was cheaper to make than bakelite and galalith and more stable than celluloid, so from the 1940s on it became the plastic used in jewellery. Lucite is originally translucent (it was invented to be used by the military for windshields), but it can be dyed many colours and made completely opaque.
Porcelain is a kind of ceramic, which is made of minerals fired at very high temperatures. Porcelain can be moulded in room temperature and only hardens when fired, whereas glass can only be moulded when melted. Porcelain beads were very popular in the 19th and 20th century in France, as a machine was invented that could make pressed porcelain beads quickly and in bigger quantities.
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