No one knows exactly when or where glass was first made. Glass appears to have been produced as far back as the second millennium BC in Mesopotamia. Glass was a lot less common back then than it is today.

The art of glass making eventually reached Egypt. The Egyptians used a method called core-forming. A shaped core was made of clay and dung, then molten glass was wrapped around it and shaped by rolling it on a smooth surface. Glass-making is known to have been highly developed in ancient Egypt based on the glass beads, jars, figures, and ornaments discovered in the tombs

It was very much later, around the end of the 1st century BC, that a new method, glass blowing would revolutionize glass production. This art was probably discovered along the Eastern Mediterranean coast, probably in Syria. By blowing through a hollow tube, the experienced glass blower can quickly produce intricate and symmetrical shapes out of the "gather" of molten glass at the end of his tube (rod). Alternatively, he can blow the molten glass into a mould.

The glass blowing innovation, along with the backing of the powerful Roman Empire, made glass products more accessible to the common people. As the size of the Roman Empire increased, the art of glass making spread to many countries.

However, it was to be another two centuries later that in 1676, an Englishman named George Ravenscroft; searching for a way to improve the luster and clarity of his glassware found that by adding lead oxide to his molten mixture he could not only improve the clarity ( crystal clear) of the glass but dramatically increase the weight, the index of refraction and the ability to cut the material without fracturing. This new glass became known as lead crystal and very quickly became the perfect medium for glasscutters and engravers. Over the past 300 years, their skills, proudly passed from generation to generation, have given lead crystal its world famous reputation.

In 1892, Daniel Swarovski invented a machine to cut jewelry stones perfectly.  In 1895, he moved his company, known as Swarovski, from Bohemia to the Wattens, Austria where he used the Rhine River as a source of energy to run the company’s machinery.  From here the name “Rhinestone” was born.  Today the word “rhinestone” is used for lead crystal coming from any country, though Swarovski is the highest quality lead crystal stone manufacturer in the world today.