Tortoiseshell’s Cousin

I really enjoyed this new video from Townsend’s channel.  The point he makes repeatedly is that tortoiseshell and horn are truly natural plastics that can be shaped by thermodynamic forces of heat and pressure.  Chemically they are very similar, mostly keratin, but morphologically they are quite different.  Historically horn was used to mimic tortoiseshell for decorative veneers by painting the mottled pattern on the verso.