Worldbuilding: White Gold Magic

Gold, silver, gems, silks; all of these are excellent treasures for any fantastic setting. But one of the most sought-after treasures of the early modern world, after the Portuguese began steady sea-trade with China and the East, was porcelain.

Snow-white, eggshell-thin; translucent in sunlight, painted in brilliant colors, and impervious to liquid. Tap it, and it chimes. Like silk it quickly went from exotic import to an absolute necessity to show breeding and good taste, the prices ruining families, fortunes, and much of Europe.

Something had to be done. Given none of the upper class could hold onto power by demonstrating thrift and restraint, the only solution was for Europeans to make it themselves. The Arcanum, by Janet Gleeson, covers how alchemists and the first porcelain factory at Meissen finally cracked the problem.

The interesting part is how well making porcelain could fit into a fantasy world, and how you could use magic to make a beautiful product.

First, you need the clay; kaolin clay, composed of kaolinite, a hydrated aluminum silicate, from ancient deposits of weathered granite. You could use find minerals to find the rare deposits of kaolin… or if none was to hand but you have plenty of magic to spare, look for much more common good granite deposits. Either quarry your rocks and move them to your factory, where you can pulverize them with a giant’s fist, or use disintegrate or stone to mud right there and scoop up the results.

You’re not done yet. Your powdery clay or mud will still have bits of sand, feldspar, and other things, just as regular kaolin clay would. Now it’s time to use earth-shaping (preferably rock-shaping) spells again to carve out a series of basins, and water elementals to turn your clay to slurry and churn it, one basin at a time. Coarsest bits will fall out in the first basin, less coarse in the second, and so on until you have a fine wet mix.

This now needs to be pressed and filtered to get water out and leave the fine kaolin particles behind. Perhaps dryads would be willing to weave meshes of roots?

At last, your clay. Which is only the first component. Even at the searingly hot temperatures porcelain is fired at, kaolin won’t melt; only soften. You need another ingredient to melt and give it glassy, waterproof substance. Two rocks reliably do the job; alabaster (which gives a lemon hint to the white) and petuntse, a volcanic tuff, that gives a bluish tint. Time for another find minerals spell.

Once you’ve got your rock, disintegrate again, to the fineness of powdered sugar. Mix the powder and kaolin in specific proportions to a creamy batter, have the dryads filter-press it again, and then…  well, you could just leave the paste resting in damp cellars to become plastic. (As in something you can mold, not the common substance plastic.) Or you could accelerate time!

Either way, you then need to mold your pieces – all larger than you want the finished ware – and let them air-dry slowly for about three months. (A haste spell may or may not be helpful here. Experiment!) You’re looking for pieces to dry to about 15% smaller than they started out.

Now you need earth and fire spells to set up your kiln. ‘Cause it’s gotta be hot. How well can a fireball be temperature-controlled? Pieces first need to be fired at 800 C (just below where salt melts) then cooled and glazed, then fired again at 1450 C (stainless steel starts melting a few degrees below here) and the kiln allowed to cool down slowly.

For the glaze – find minerals again, and a lot of experiments compounding useful and pretty colors.

Once your ware is cool? White gold. From magic.

No philosopher’s stone required.