Plastic can mimic more expensive materials

But it could be tinted and patterned to mimic more expensive materials like coral, tortoiseshell, amber, and mother-of-pearl. He had created what became known as the first plastic. The word ‘plastic’ can describe any material made of polymers, which are just the large molecules consisting of the same repeating subunit. This includes all human-made plastics, as well as many of the materials found in living things.