Hands-on with Glue: Exploring Material Ontologies of Historical Sticky Stuff

Testing lip glue recipe
Testing the lip glue in Utrecht.

In June 2025, I was kindly invited by Marjolijn Bol to co-coordinate the hands-on workshop ‘Hands-On with Glue: Exploring Material Ontologies of Historical Sticky Stuff’ hosted by the Cambridge Material Culture Forum.

The session took place in a laboratory of the Department of Archaeology. Marjolijn presented an overview of her work on durability with the DURARE project, and I gave a report of my recent experiences as a fellow.

Together with the mixed group of archaeologists, historians and STS scholars, we enacted a recipe for early-modern lip glues — paper adhesives meant to be carried in the pocket and wet on the lips when used.

Dehydrating lip glue samples
Dehydrating samples.
Hydrating hide glue
Hydrating glue.
Crushing gum arabic with a pestle
Crushing gum arabic.