Featured Curious bakelite and silver ring

This is a curious bakelite and silver ring. I have tried the silver. The rest of the ring I guess is bakelite. Do you have any information, such as the approximate year of manufacture?
Thanks.

 

The main body looks to me like rings made from water buffalo horn.

 

Nice ring, Jal.
I'm with Bronwen, the main part looks like water buffalo horn. Maybe bone for the lighter inlay.
The silver could be set in blonde water buffalo horn. For comparison, this keris hilt is blonde buffalo horn:

 

I was going to say:
Not bakelite, looks like some sort of bone.
Will defer to Bronwen and Any that it is buffalo horn.
Interesting ring.

 

I was just wondering about that, reading this for the first time.

The ring is lovely, and seems unusual. The initials in the silver are such a different style from the rest of the ring. Much more ornate!

 

@Jal, there are tests for Bakelite, you can Google for how to do it. Having it in hand it would be easy for you to eliminate or confirm Bakelite to help everyone's thoughts that the ring is horn

 

Hi Marie,
A lot of black and red Bakelite do not react the way normal Bakelite does.
greg

 

I rule out that it is made of horn, as it does not have a fibrous texture. Also, in the photos it does not look good, it has a metallic sunflower color.
I attach some photos of other similar bakelite or celluloid rings that I found.

 

This is a better picture that can help. What I'm not sure about is when and where it was made. Some are described as prisoner rings, others art deco.

 

Good easy test for bakelite without investing in anything outside yourself:

Rub material with fingers until fingers are warm. Sniff fingers (not material!) immediately. If your fingers smell like formaldehyde, it's bakelite. If your fingers smell of anything else, it's not.

If you don't know what formaldehyde smells like rub first an item you're positive IS made of bakelite and compare.

Having seen a few rings and bracelets of this type this ring could have been made in India, probably in the 1970s-1990s, of bone and horn, and the decorative initials M and V applied later. Thus, not necessarily in the era that this lettering style suggests, a bridge style between Nouveau and Deco.

 

Hi lizjewel,

I tried to do the bakelite essay but really don't feel anything special, maybe I'm not used to it. But I'm sure it's not made with horn and bone.

Thanks for your reply.

 

Ivory and ebony?

 

Hi,
Indeed, I bought it as bone and wood, but as you can see in the pictures, the item have a metallic shine. It looks like he was trying to look carey.

 

Sorry, but your unusual English eludes me: "..trying to look carey." I knew a man named Carey once, he was Irish. Any connection? What's meant by carey here?

 

Sorry, I meant that maybe it was made to look like a turtle shell. My English is not too good.

 

I have come across a lot of bakelite jewelry in the past, all kinds, vintage and modern.

Genuine Bakelite is not formed by moulding, it's extruded. Certain types of plastic have been misnamed bakelite but they're moulded, not extruded.

Rings, IMHO, may have been made from extruded pipes but I have not seen many. They were never big when Bakelite WAS big in the late 1930s [am not talking about the 1990's revival craze here].

Bakelite back in the '30s was flounted by movie stars and socialites in wide bracelet cuffs, funny necklaces, brooches with animals and fruit pending from them. These attachments were carved from bakelite pipes or blocks, not moulded in forms.

Not that bakelite rings could not have been made back then but I don't believe they were very big in fashion at that time. Many plastic rings imitating bakelite circulated in the 1990s (Bakelite craze).

The flaked off the areas on your ring speaks of a lacquer having been applied now worn off. Have you tried to find out what's under the lacquer?

 

If it was horn would it fluoresce under UV?. Could discount horn quickly if OP has a UV light. There again, does all horn fluoresce....off to google.....again.

 

I think it is not made of moldings, I think it is carved. It is not well seen in the photos, but it has lathe marks inside. also the material seems parched by the passage of time. These two events are what make it look like a horn.
In my opinion, the ring does not seem from the 90s, I never saw anything like it in that decade, but I don't know when it should be.
In reference to your lacquer question, sorry, I don't appreciate any worn lacquer on the ring.

Thanks for your interesting comments!!!

 

I don't have UV light, but thanks for explain this technique, very interesting!!

 

This is wonderful information. Thank you! You’ve helped to answer a question I had on one of my pieces with his! Bakelite is an interesting material, and I’ve much material to obsess over it would seem!