Nic initially followed another creative path and enrolled in film school with ambitions of becoming a director. Over time, however, his enthusiasm for the medium began to fade. He found himself increasingly drawn toward work that was physical and tangible—something made directly with his hands that could connect one person to another and continue to carry meaning long after it left the workshop.

A chance meeting with Montreal luthier Lenny Piroth-Robert transformed that long-standing fascination into a practical possibility. The encounter became an apprenticeship, then a job and ultimately a lifelong friendship. Despite his initial doubts, Nic committed himself fully to guitarmaking and began the process of developing his own visual language, construction methods and ideas about what an electric guitar could be.

In 2010, he joined the Mile End Guitar Coop and established Island Instruments. The cooperative became much more than a shared workshop. Surrounded by builders with different backgrounds, specialties and approaches, Nic found mentors, collaborators, students and friends. The constant exchange of knowledge and experimentation allowed his work to develop within a community while remaining unmistakably personal.

His influences reach well beyond conventional guitar design, encompassing department-store catalogue instruments, free jazz, noise music, mid-century industrial design, experimental materials and builders such as Ken Parker. He is interested in the guitar’s history, but does not view that history as a fixed set of rules. For Nic, the instrument remains unfinished territory, with ample room for new materials, new forms and new relationships between player and object.

At the centre of his work is the human exchange. Every Island guitar begins with a conversation. Through that conversation, Nic interprets the needs and personality of an individual player while bringing his own experiences, ideas and craftsmanship to the instrument. The finished guitar carries several intertwined stories: the history of its materials, the intentions of its owner and the life of the person who made it.

That relationship is what continues to give the work meaning. For Nic, building a guitar is not simply the manufacture of an object. It is an act of attention, trust and connection—and the beginning of a new story once the instrument leaves his hands.