Paper short abstract:

Corporations and citizens used chrysotile asbestos, a white, fluffy, and carcinogenic material, to represent snow indoors in the first half of the twentieth century. This paper is concerned with how asbestos was used to mimic snow in domestic homes at Christmas and in Hollywood studios.

Paper long abstract:

Humans in snow-heavy regions design their lives and habitats to shelter from the deadly risks snow inherently poses to life, but this doesn’t mean that snow doesn’t retain a romantic appeal. The first half of the twentieth century was a transition period, where people looked for ways to bring snow into their interior spaces because of this appeal, transforming cultural understandings of the frozen material and wider environmental values. New enviro-tech products simulated the look of snow and marketed products that augmented nature to eliminate the risk of cold or melt.

One of the most utilised and ‘realistic’ forms of early simulated snow was chrysotile asbestos, because it was white, fluffy, and its crystalline structure glimmered when light shone upon it. Dusted on Christmas trees, wreaths, and other seasonal decorations, asbestos-snow became a domestic accent, while the seemingly more impractical and dangerous natural snow remained outside. Asbestos snow was also used in Hollywood productions—most notably in the Wizard of Oz (1939) and White Christmas (1954)—to simulate fluffy falling snow on set without risking fire with more flammable material like cotton. This popularised the use of artificial snow and transformed expectations of the human this paper explores the enviro-techno-efforts to create artificial snow with asbestos and the deep cultural—and health—transformation that came with this attempt to simulate and augment the natural world for human consumption.