Nick Noyes
"I had an amazing geology teacher that took us mining for crystals in Herkimer, New York for Herkimer diamonds, and fluorescent stones in Franklin, New Jersey, and this sparked a lifelong love of gemstones. I started collecting and mining all over the place including Maine, New Hampshire, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, kind of everywhere on the East Coast, even over to Arkansas. I had this huge collection of gemstones and I didn't know really know what to do with it. They were just taking up every little shelf that I had and a friend of mine had started making wire-wrapped jewelry. He showed me a few things and it seemed like a really cool way to be able to showcase stones that I found. I ended up going to different concerts and festivals and selling them and it kind of sparked this idea that this is actually something that I could do as a job and from there ended up going to a jewelry school in Tennessee called New Approach School For Jewelers. This is kind of really where, you know, it became less of a hobby and more of a career. Throughout the entirety I've loved, I just love what I do. I love making jewelry, it's like it's every day is a new adventure. Being able to make a living at it, which I've done, has been my only job for almost 14 years now. Being able to sustain me while doing something that I love is also something that I've really tried to encourage and pass on to others. Because I grew up lacking a lot of direction, always kind of having this artistic, you know, I loved art in many ways. But I went to college without any direction, I didn't know what I wanted to do, and not a lot of focus. And it's really as soon as I discovered jewelry and creating it sparked this, this need that I didn't even know that I had to be able to create, but also to sustain myself, you know, I think there's a starving artists kind of view of, of, if you want to be an artist, then you're going to be poor kind of thing," said Noyes.
Prior to Nick discovering his passion for jewelry, he didn't really know what activities he truly had a passion for and wanted to excel in for the future. Crafting jewelry is his lifeline.
"You know, I think if someone had asked me, Well, what do you want to do with your life? At that point, I would have said, I have no idea. I like hiking and coffee. So I didn't really know. And so at that point, you know, I lived in Florida for a little bit. And I just applied anywhere that I could get a job and I worked at Quiznos and I worked at a country club. I enjoyed both those places thoroughly. Even though in many ways I knew that this is not where I wanted my life to end up. And so you know, at the same time kind of recultivating my love for gems and minerals and reconnecting with an old friend that I had grown up with who had started making jewelry, it suddenly became this thing where it seemed not even necessarily like a way out, but just something that I could pour my creative energy into," said Nick.
Nick has crafted many pieces and some have been quite challenging. Between the materials and the process but the end result is always special.
"Well, as of late, the most challenging piece that I made was this all old gold custom it was all 18 karat gold, but 18 karat yellow, rose, and white gold. So it's just multiple-color golds. And what I've found throughout my journey, in general, is that different color metals don't love working together, I have to come up with different ways, you know, especially my first into that was gold and silver aren't just like mortal enemies you have to just kind of trick them into joining. Because metals heat at different temperatures. And certain things, you know, if you were to quench a piece, it can, you know, for instance, if you're soldering something and you don't let it cool down all the way, and you punch it in water, and it's gold and silver bullet cool at different temperatures, and one can crack. It's a horrible lesson learned. But the most challenging piece recently was this all-gold custom piece, just trying to get all the metals to work with was quite a challenge. Second behind that is the piece that I made for the main Mineral Museum, mainly for the anxiety factor of setting a huge one-of-a-kind stone. I work with a lot of one-of-a-kind gems, but they're one-of-a-kind in the sense of the way that they're cut. It's a little different when it's a one-of-a-kind stone that's 50 years old, that there aren't anymore if something were to happen to," said Nick.
Tune in to learn more about Nick Noyes and his maker journey.
Please visit his website here.
To see Nick’s final piece follow the Makers of the USA on Instagram and Facebook and Maine Mineral & Gem Museum on Instagram and Facebook as well as the images will be posted on both of those social media platforms.