We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Mike Hurst a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Mike , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

I’ve always enjoyed art and felt I’m creative, although I never anticipated being where I am today. I took pottery and photography in high school. They were fun classes, but I never had a desire to do either otherwise.

Growing up, I watched two very creative parents always doing something. My dad worked in electronic repair and maintenance at Hill Air Force Base for his career but could literally do just about anything. From auto mechanics to all-around handyman. He has always tinkered and enjoyed hobbyist woodworking. My mom is very talented and has always had some craft or project she’s learning. From ceramics, counted cross stitch. toll painting, candy making, soap making, polymer clay, cake decorating, hand beading, lampwork bead making and more.

After a suggestion from my mom shortly after my 18th birthday, I began searching out neon sign making. It wasn’t a successful search, and I hit nothing but dead ends initially. Several months later a chance conversation my mom overheard while waiting in line at a local mom & pop fabric store changed my life. She overheard the owner and a customer discussing the owner’s son being a glassblower. I contacted him and he agreed to teach me. He wasn’t a neon sign maker, he was a lampworker. I had no idea what a lampworker was.

Lampworking is the art of using a propane or natural gas and oxygen fueled torch to heat glass to manipulate or sculpt it. Prior to the invention compressed gasses, a paraffin or alcohol fueled “lamp” was used in conjunction with a 90-degree tube aimed behind the lamp and supplied with ambient air forced through it with an accordion baffle. The air blown across the flame accelerated it, making it hot enough to heat and soften glass to sculpt.

I began my journey in January or 1994. My teacher made everything from fancy cake tops to hummingbirds, ships and just about anything else you can imagine. All in clear Pyrex (borosilicate) glass. He was self-taught and was very talented at what he did. He taught me steadily for about 3 or 4 months and then had taught me everything he knew. I was no good, but I was determined to learn to make full color marbles & pendants at first, as my teacher used 99.9% clear with a tiny colored dot for an eye or small decoration.

At this time “Stains” and “Lusters” were common ways of coloring glass. Stains were basically thinned down transparent acetone-based fingernail polish that faded and chipped over time. Lusters were painted on the clear glass and fired in a kiln. A cool effect, but a pain to use and they smelled terrible when the liquid dried and burned off in the kiln.

In May or June 1994 I got a job in a local sign shop as a “neon pump man.” I would take the finished bent tubes and anneal them, remove the impurities with a direct vacuum system and fill them with either argon or neon gas to make them work. While I enjoyed the job, I really didn’t see it as something I was interested in doing as a career.

I had a number of different day jobs and did lampwork after work and on the weekends. It was an expensive hobby, but I enjoyed it. At this point the internet was in its infancy and there was no such thing as Facebook or YouTube to gain any insight or help. I had the only book I knew of and couldn’t afford the only VHS instructional videos I knew of. Basically, if you didn’t know of a supplier you were stuck because information and suppliers were held secretly by those few who worked in the field at the time.

I continued to practice and learn by trial and error. Some things took years to figure out. Some things I never figured out on my own and when I finally found out how to do the techniques it was frustrating just how close I was, not even thinking of a step or two to reach the final desired result.

Some years passed and in December 1998 I learned of a new county jail being built and a demand for corrections officers. I attended the Fred House Corrections Academy in Draper, UT from April – June 1999. It was a decent career with benefits and a 20-year retirement at 50% of my income. I figured I could hone my skills for 20 years and if the sun, moon and stars aligned I’d retire and roll over into lampworking full time.

Well, the sun, moon and stars must have aligned. Here we are 31+ years into my “journey.” I’ve been retired almost 6 years and I’m now a full-time lampwork glassblower.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I touched on some of this in the previous question. I specialize in Christmas ornaments, marbles, pendants, ink dip pens. spinning tops, wind chimes, memorial pieces incorporating human or pet cremains (also known as “ash”) into my work, and much more. I don’t care to do much custom work, except for memorial pieces. I’m always game to listen and see what the customer wants, but sometimes it just isn’t meant to be.

I feel I’m a very well-rounded lampworker. I make so many different things that I rarely get bored because I just move on to making something different.

I’m proud to be a “one man band.” I do everything myself, and truly want to do everything. I get asked all the time about taking on an apprentice to help do prep work, production work and clean up in exchange to learn. While I’m not opposed to teaching someone, it has to be the right fit. As much as I hate doing some prep work, production pieces and cleaning the work area, it’s just part of the job and it pays the bills. I’m also proud to have started in a time where information regarding this trade was held extremely valuable. I had to figure things out on my own without much, if any, real help while I was in the trial-and-error point of my career. Information is so easy to obtain now. I admit it is very handy and has really grown the industry and quality of the art. I feel lucky to have experienced both sides of the educational experience.

I typically spend 6 to 8 months a year working on stock and Christmas ornaments for the holiday season. I’ve always made Christmas ornaments, but around 2015 I decided to step it up and make them my main focus. I estimate I make 1000+ icicles and probably just as many bulb ornaments as well as Christmas tree tops. I also really enjoy making marbles.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

As much as I value the time and effort I put into having to figure out things on my own, I often wonder where I’d be if I had access to the same resources and information I have now.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I don’t have a huge social media following. I haven’t pursued it and spent the time to grow it like I probably should, but I’m happy where I’m at currently. I also focus more on Facebook than Instagram, Tik Tok or the other social media platforms available.

The biggest way I grew my online following is by doing giveaways at different milestones. Typically, with every 250 new followers on my Facebook business page I’d do a giveaway. It doesn’t need to be anything huge or expensive. People love freebies and giveaways. I’d simply ask folks to like and share my page including the giveaway. When the milestone is reached, I do a number guess. I make a post telling followers to guess a number between 0 and about 500 higher than the number of followers I have to give some room for everyone to be able to guess a unique number. To make this work smoothest, I include that it is the participants responsibility to make sure they have guessed a unique number and for any duplicates it will go to the first person who picked that number. I also add that ALL submissions must be in that post thread. This helps to keep all the guesses in one place. Clearly state when the contest will end and include your time zone. At the end of the contest, you can use an online number generator to pick a number. It’s good top record and include a video of you doing it, as this builds excitement, and it is clear the winner was drawn at random.

This has been very effective for me and others who have tried it.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.hurstsglass.com
• Instagram: @hurstsglass
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hurstsglass
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@hurstsglass