We’ve posted the interview below, you should also check out The Wedding Standard here, it is the source for planning an unforgettable event on the central coast.

Baxter Moerman Jewelry

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Cen­tral Coast Jew­el­ers Matt Bax­ter & Matt Moer­man are two cre­ative guys who cre­ate one of kind artis­tic hand made pieces. They have been work­ing together for years on col­lab­o­ra­tions and finally ven­tured out with their own store front in the heart of down­town San Luis Obispo. Walk­ing through their shop you won’t find any­thing you’ve seen before. They don’t carry lots of stock jew­elry because they cus­tomize most jew­lery for their clients. They both had a hand in design­ing and build­ing me and my wife’s wed­ding bands and her engage­ment ring. We wanted some­thing as unique as our love and they totally pulled it off bril­liantly! The design process with these guys was so much fun and are always so proud to share their work with peo­ple we meet who ask us about our unique rings.

How did you get started in doing what you do?
B: I got my start by tak­ing a class on sil­ver­smithing while at James Madi­son Uni­ver­sity in Har­rison­burg, VA. Once I found sil­ver­smithing and jew­elry design, I had no doubt the path I wanted to take.
M: I took a jew­elry class in the craft cen­ter at Cal Poly and instantly real­ized jew­elry was the per­fect medium to express my ideas with.

Do you con­sider what you do as an art form? (if so… explain)
M: Of course! We look at jew­elry as small scale sculp­ture that comes to life when worn.

Who or what con­tin­ues to inspires you?
B: We each see things a slightly dif­fer­ent way. Work­ing together, we can take our designs to an inter­est­ing place they oth­er­wise would not have gone. We have a friendly com­pet­i­tive spirit that dri­ves us to make bet­ter and bet­ter qual­ity pieces.
M: Nature! We are sur­rounded by the most amaz­ing designs and tex­tures, from eroded hill­sides with color stri­a­tions to tiny seeds arranged in a pod, inspi­ra­tion is everywhere.

What makes your busi­ness unique?
We only carry jew­elry that we have designed and made right here in our shop. We also work closely with cus­tomers to cre­ate heir­loom qual­ity jew­elry, engage­ment rings, wed­ding rings, and pieces to com­mem­o­rate a spe­cial day.

How would you describe your ideal cou­ple?
B: The cou­ple that has a good grasp on what they want, but allows us to put our spin on the design and take it in an inter­est­ing direc­tion. A trust­ing couple.

What’s your per­sonal busi­ness phi­los­o­phy?

B: Do what you say, when you say you are going to do it. If you make a qual­ity prod­uct in a pro­fes­sional man­ner, you will always have customers.

Favorite part of a wed­ding?
B: When the bride emerges to walk down the isle.
M: The reception.

 

Why do you… do what you do?
B: I am enjoy pro­duc­ing things with my hands, and the detail ori­ented craft of fine jew­elry. Often work­ing under a micro­scope, our jew­elry is all about the details. It’s hard to describe, but I love the per­sonal chal­lenge of mak­ing my next piece the best one I have ever made.
M: He took my answer.

What ques­tion do you always ask the Bride & Groom?
M: How did you meet?

First music album you ever bought?
B: U2– Rat­tle And Hum
M: Run DMC — Rais­ing Hell

Favorite movie or doc­u­men­tary?
B: “Dead Man”- Jim Jar­musch
M: Genghis Blues

Song that makes you want to dance like nobody’s watch­ing?
B: “Sug­ar­foot”- Black Joe Lewis & The Hon­ey­bears
M: “The Ring” — Jamie Lidell

How do you nor­mally begin your day?
B: Very sim­ply. A stretch, shower, cof­fee, and a break­fast of cereal/yogurt/almond milk, or two ‘toads-in-a-hole’.
M: My daugh­ters usu­ally wake me up to make break­fast, I also require a few cups of coffee.

What do you enjoy doing on your day off?
B: Enjoy­ing the com­pany of friends, going for a surf on the north coast, and work­ing on jew­elry at the shop with­out inter­rup­tion.
M: Play­ing gui­tar, check­ing out the tide pools with the fam­ily, hiking.

Do you col­lect any­thing?
M: Not obses­sively, I like pick­ing up rocks and shells on the beach, or inter­est­ing nat­ural spec­i­mens.
B: Bad habits.

Tell us about your first job?
B: Mow­ing lawns.
M: Landscaping.

 What would you say is your great­est accom­plish­ment?
B: Walk­ing the entire length of the Appalachian Trail in 2005. I took 4.5 months to walk the 2174.9 miles north from Geor­gia to Maine.
M: Open­ing Bax­ter Moer­man Jewelry.

How do you sign off on emails?
M: Thanks, Cheers.

If you moved to a for­eign coun­try, which one & why?
M: Barcelona, Spain. I love the vibe of the city, it’s laid back, and I am a fan of art nouveau.

If you were an ani­mal, what would you be?
B: A red-tail hawk.
M: A moose.

If you were in a band, what instru­ment would you play?
M: I’ve played gui­tar in sev­eral bands.
B: Bass.

Ok, tell us your Nickname(s)?
M: My favorite was given by my sis­ter in law — “Pichu“
B: “FattyBaxter”

Wed­ding trend that your lov­ing right now?
M: Peo­ple break­ing out of the mold of tra­di­tion, using col­ored stones in engage­ment rings or inter­est­ing bands instead of a soli­taire engage­ment.
B: The new tra­di­tion seems to be the non-traditional wed­ding set. Whether it’s rose gold or rose-cut dia­monds, we have a port­fo­lio full of work we have pro­duced for cus­tomers that sim­ply could not set­tle for a generic wed­ding set. Almost every man requires a custom-made ring that refers to their per­son­al­ity, though most folks assume men have no opin­ion when it comes to jew­elry except the price of obtain­ing it.

Read the book or watch the movie?
M: Book and movie, in that order.

Stranded on a desert island… list three things you’d bring with you?
M: Surf­board, sun­block, cock­tails.
B: He took my answer.

Tell us your favorite song or band (new or old)… right now?
M: I’m cur­rently in a delta blues phase, gritty acoustic blues.
B: The band “Mid­dle Brother”, it’s got Delta Spirit, Deer Tick, and Dawes all in one great band.

Favorite quote?
M: “The only con­stant is change.” (Πάντα ῥεῖ καὶ οὐδὲν μένει)

What sound do you love?
B: Flow­ing creeks, crash­ing waves, morn­ing thun­der­storms, cicadas in the sum­mer­time.
M: A cof­fee pot per­co­lat­ing, my kids laugh­ing, the rain.

If and when it hap­pens… what do you want peo­ple to remem­ber you by?
M: A pos­i­tive atti­tude.
B: Kindness.

What do you want to be when you grow up?
M: Enlight­ened.
B: Old.

What’s the hard­est thing you’ve ever had to do?
B: For­giv­ing a tres­pass of a friend. So hard some­times, but so easy when I real­ize just how often I act like an ass.

Whats the great­est gife you’ve ever given or received?
M: LOVE
B: The encour­age­ment of my par­ents. They brought me up (either inten­tion­ally or unin­ten­tion­ally) to fol­low my own path, and encour­aged me along the way.

What do you miss most about being a kid?
M: The lack of respon­si­bil­ity, and how time seemed to crawl by.
B: Explor­ing the out­doors with­out any com­mit­ments except get­ting home before dinner.

What’s in the top 5 of your bucket list?
We travel with empty buckets.

Tell us some­thing you learned last week?
M: Some­times snakes are born with two heads and if it’s a snake-eating snake it will attack itself!

At What age did you really become an adult?
M: 28
B: What’s an adult?

The rarest gem in the quartz family is a vivid blue or blue-green microcrystalline quartz known in the trade as gem silica. Sometime referred to as gem silica chrysocolla or chrysocolla chalcedony, it forms in copper-rich areas where the copper silicate known as chrysocolla combines with chalcedony quartz.

The main attraction of this gemstone is its remarkable color. The intense color is due to the presence of copper salts that penetrate the crystal lattice of colorless chalecedony. Though there are other copper-bearing gems that can display a similar color saturation, such as turquoise and chrysocolla, these are much softer stones and are not durable enough for everyday rings. The term “gem” in “gem silica” indicates that this material is gem quality, and in fact it has a hardness of 7 on the Mohs scale and is suitable for all kinds of jewelry, including rings.

But the best gem silica has more than a vivid color. It also has significant translucency that gives it a special glow. Clean specimens with excellent translucency are sought after by collectors. In the Asian market, gem silica is in demand for its resemblance to the highest grades of jade. In the west, the paraiba-like color and rarity are the main selling points.

The chief sources for this rare gem are in Arizona, USA and Peru and Chile in South America. These locations are among the main copper mining locations in the world.

Arizona is the leading copper producing state in the US, with 60% of the US production. Copper mining is a multibillion dollar business with many industrial applications. Unfortunately with the advent of modern mechanized mining, it is no longer possible to interrupt copper mining to extract the gem silica when a new pocket is discovered. So the only locations yielding new material are those where mining is still carried out with pick and shovel.

The main sources of gem silica in Arizona are the Inspiration Mine in the Globe-Miami area, and the Ray Mine in the southern part of the state, about 65 miles east of Phoenix. Due to copper mining practices, neither mine has yielded new material in the last 20 years, and all the material in the market was discovered years ago and put aside or held in family collections. The scarcity of fine material has driven up prices on top grade gem silica as demand from collectors continues to grow. The Inspiration Mine is noted for very fine translucent material which has the distinctive glow prized by collectors. Material from the Ray Mine tends to be opaque, but of a vivid blue color.

More recently, we have seen new gem silica from Peru enter the market. The first Peruvian material was quite opaque and olive to forest green in color. But more recently we have seen some fine blue-green stones from Peru, with good translucency. The main source is the Lily mine in Pisco Umay, about 200 km south of  Lima. Some of the Peruvian material has dendrite inclusions which form interesting patterns.

We here at BAXTER MOERMAN have a nice selection of gem silica, including a couple of gorgeous matched pairs, just waiting to create your next beautiful piece of  jewelry!  Come in and take a peek at this rare and beautiful gem.

Custom Necklace in 18K white gold
and gem silica by Baxter Moerman

Silver and Shibuichi

Mokume Gane

18K Rose Gold, 2.69ct peach sapphire and diamonds