Please note our museum hours while we undergo renovations.
About Magazine Podcasts Events
Museum HoursWed–Fri: 12:30pm–5pm | Sat: 10am–5pm

Distillations magazine
Unexpected Stories from Science’s Past
Arts & Culture Early Science & Alchemy Environment Health & Medicine Inventions & Discoveries People & Politics
July 23, 2015 Early Science & Alchemy

Making and Knowing (Fake) Coral

Watch historians re-create a recipe for imitation coral, a popular material in early modern jewelry and home décor.

gloved hand mixing ingredients for an experiment
About SUPPORT OUR WORK

In a cramped lab, historians from Columbia University and the Chemical Heritage Foundation (now the Science History Institute) are reconstructing a 16th-century workshop by re-creating recipes from an anonymous craftsperson’s manuscript. One of the recipes being pursued is for imitation coral, a popular material in early modern jewelry and home décor.

More from our magazine

Color illustration, strawberries in pattern on a pink background
DISTILLATIONS MAGAZINE

The Ripe Stuff

Pursuit of the perfect fruit.

Old book engraving colored by hand and showing a man with various types of weapons embedded in different parts of his body
DISTILLATIONS MAGAZINE

Of Mummies, Moss, and Magic

A conversation on the weapon salve, a sensational cure.

Color illustration of a museum interior looking down a hall of arched opening showing a large number of objects on display, including an elephant, seashells, antlers, and a kayak
DISTILLATIONS MAGAZINE

Collect Call

In early modern Europe, collecting was a way to press order on a world made increasingly strange.

    Republish

    Copy the above HTML to republish this content. We have formatted the material to follow our guidelines, which include our credit requirements. Please review our full list of guidelines for more information. By republishing this content, you agree to our republication requirements.