Material reference

Cherry Quartz (Glass) · Likha ng Liwanag

Scientific identity, documented history, and community contexts are presented with sources. TÁWID’s contemporary design interpretation is identified separately.

Material identity

“Cherry Quartz” is the commercial name used here for manufactured decorative glass. It is neither natural crystalline quartz nor laboratory-grown quartz. The distinction is about structure and manufacture, not about whether the material can be attractive or skillfully worked. A trade label does not establish one fixed glass recipe.

Quartz can be a raw source of silica for glassmaking, but melting and processing silica with other ingredients produces a material with a different structure. A glass bead containing decorative colour does not become a mineral variety simply because “quartz” appears in its sales name. [1]

Documented historical context

The first use of the exact “Cherry Quartz” label is not established in the references consulted. A documented comparison is the longer history of glass evoking stone. Corning describes Louis Comfort Tiffany’s “Agate” glass, developed for windows after his company opened in 1893 and subsequently used for blown vessels. Its collection includes a Favrile “Agate” vase dated about 1897–1899.

That object records the translation of stone-like patterns into a manufactured medium. It is a comparison in glass design, not a shared recipe or origin for Cherry Quartz. [4]

Philippine and community context

The Met records an eighteenth–nineteenth-century Philippine pendant made of gold alloy and glass. It documents glass incorporated into jewellery alongside metal. Neither the pendant record nor the National Museum’s archaeological glass-bead collection identifies the modern material sold as Cherry Quartz. [2] [3]

TÁWID’s contemporary interpretation

Likha ng Liwanag is TÁWID’s contemporary title for creative work and transparency about materials.

References

1. Handbook of Mineralogy, “Quartz” (2001)
2. National Museum of the Philippines, “Ornaments”
3. Metropolitan Museum of Art, “Pendant,” Philippines, eighteenth–nineteenth century, 12.176.29
4. Corning Museum of Glass, “Agate,” interpretive notes on Louis Comfort Tiffany’s agate glass

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