Chemical composition of glitter

Answer 1

Body glitter is made from 2 classes of material: 1) mica, a natural mineral; or 2) plastic.

Hobby glitter is predominantly the latter.

Pulverized mica gives eyeshadow foundation and some body glitter types iridescence.

Plastic glitter is made from thin plastic sheet that is either embossed with diffraction grating pattern, or a thin metal coating, or both. Then the reflective plastic sheet is shredded to make tens of microns to hundreds of microns scale powder. color comes from dye, embossed patter (like beetle carapace or feather colorant nanotech) or both.

Google search can give pertinent references. -rpm

Answer 2

Glitter is typically made from a thin sheet of plastic film coated with metallic or colored pigments. Other materials may also be added for sparkle, such as glass or aluminum. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is a common plastic used to make glitter.