Art by Nyomi: The Trinidad Jeweller Turning Flowers Into Wearable Art

For Nyomi Thomas, art was a language she was already fluent in, one she simply had to learn how to speak on her own terms.

That language now shows up on wrists, ears and necklines across Trinidad and Tobago, the wider Caribbean, and as far as Dubai, in the form of hand-painted, resin-covered flowers that seem to bloom straight off the page. It is the signature of Art by Nyomi, the jewellery and mixed-media brand Nyomi built from a secondary school sketchbook into a name people now recognize on sight.

“I would describe my brand as like a floral explosion,” Nyomi says. “Very Caribbean, very colourful, very unique, something that you will not find anywhere else.”

From the Classroom to the Craft Table

Nyomi always knew art would be part of her life. What she did not expect was for it to become the centre of it.

She entered university intending to become an art teacher, but the deeper she went into her studies, the more the plan began to shift. Exposure to other artists, local and international, past and present, cracked something open.

“I definitely broadened my horizons,” she says. “I started learning about other artists, and I was really inspired. I said, you know, maybe I can build my life around this and make this something I do all the time.”

She started Art by Nyomi in 2020. Six years later, what began as a university side project has become a full-fledged brand with a growing regional following, and Nyomi is still in her twenties.

The Notebook That Started It All

Before the earrings, before the resin, before the recognizable Art by Nyomi look, there were t-shirts and hand-painted notebooks.

Nyomi recalls painting the cover of an old notebook she had kept since secondary school and sharing it with her audience almost as an afterthought. The response told her something different.

“Everybody was like, ‘Oh, you should make more. I want this, I want this,'” she remembers. “So that’s how it ended up. I just kind of grew from the books.”

Turning Paper Flowers Into Jewellery

Art by Nyomi’s most recognizable pieces, the intricate, botanical earrings and pendants that have become the brand’s calling card, came from a simple question Nyomi asked herself while looking at a flower she had painted: could this become jewellery?

The answer took some experimenting. She revisited a childhood love of paper flower-making from secondary school, then began testing ways to turn a flat, painted flower into something sturdy enough to wear.

“I wondered how I could turn this into an earring,” she says. “And then I said, ‘Oh my gosh, I could cover it in resin.’ When I covered it in resin, it became very sturdy and wearable.”

That single discovery unlocked what is now the full Art by Nyomi process: mixed-media paper flowers, hand-painted detail, wire bending she taught herself, crystals worked into the design, and a resin finish that locks it all in place.

“My pieces are what you’d call mixed media pieces,” she explains, “because they incorporate the wire, they have crystals in them, they’re hand painted, and they’re covered in resin.”

A Whimsy Rooted in Home

The brand’s signature brightness is not an aesthetic choice so much as a reflection of how Nyomi was raised.

“My mom is a very whimsical woman,” she says. “Our house is just so colourful and bright. I just grew up around colours and they make me happy. So I just continue making colours and things that would make me happy.”

That sensibility is inseparable from her surroundings. Nyomi credits Trinidad and Tobago, and the natural world around her, as a constant, direct source of inspiration.

“There’s so much inspiration around us because we live in such a beautiful island,” she says. “Just taking a walk outside, I could see something and think, ‘Oh my gosh, I could turn this into an earring.'”

She points to the Botanical Gardens as a well she has returned to again and again, recalling one flowering fig tree in particular that stopped her in her tracks.

“I saw the tree close up, all the flowers just draping down,” she says. “How could you not be inspired by something like that? I fell in love. I had to recreate it.”

Building a Brand, One Post at a Time

Social media has been one of the most effective tools in growing Art by Nyomi beyond Trinidad’s borders, and Nyomi is candid about both its power and its unpredictability.

“You’re not in control of who sees what’s on the internet,” she says. “That’s a good thing and a bad thing, but I’m using it as a good tool.” By staying consistent and intentional with what she posts, she has watched her audience expand well past a local following. “Most of my orders come from my social media, even international ones, because people from abroad see them and they’re like, ‘Oh, I want to get some of these too.'”

Staying Handmade While Scaling Up

As demand grows, Nyomi is wrestling with a challenge familiar to many makers: how to grow a business built on hours of handwork without losing the very thing that makes it special.

“It definitely is very tiring. I’m not going to lie, because it takes hours,” she admits. “One piece takes a very long time. So, when I have to make a large amount, sometimes I get burnt out.”

Her solution is not to speed up, but to bring in support. She is currently working toward hiring an assistant, a step she hopes will ease the workload without compromising the brand’s identity.

“I always want to keep that handmade touch,” she says. “I never want Art by Nyomi to be a fast fashion thing, something you could just grab easy and quick. It’s a time-consuming thing. It’s something you’ll have to wait for. It feels intentional when it’s slower.”

The Moments That Confirmed She Was Onto Something

Two moments in particular stand out to Nyomi as proof that Art by Nyomi had reached further than she realized.

The first came from a pop-up, where a customer told her she had bought several pieces, packed them in her suitcase, and taken them to Dubai.

“She said, ‘I took them to my family, and everybody loved them there, and I’m going to continue supporting you because I want everybody to see it,'” Nyomi recalls. “I said, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m really thankful. I can’t believe that my work is all the way there before me.'”

The second was being approached for a television interview with CNC3.

“I did not even know y’all were seeing my work at this scale,” she says, “but I really appreciate it.”

What Entrepreneurship Taught Her That Art School Never Could

Ask Nyomi what running a business has taught her that being purely an artist never did, and the answer comes quickly: money.

“Financial literacy. They don’t teach you that at all,” she says. “Trying to navigate my finances, trying to figure out my prices, how am I going to grow from that. That was something I had to learn by force.”

Pricing, in particular, was a hurdle. Nyomi eventually developed her own formula after research and trial and error, and she has made peace with charging what her time and materials are worth.

“There was a point where I felt bad about pricing things,” she says. “I was like, wait, I’m sitting here for hours making this and pouring so much of myself into it. I shouldn’t feel bad.” She still keeps a range of price points, though, so the brand stays accessible. “I would like everybody to be able to share in my work.”

Who Nyomi Is, Beyond the Brand

Outside of Art by Nyomi, Nyomi describes herself in a way that will not surprise anyone who has seen her pieces.

“I would say that Nyomi is a very bubbly person. I’m very creative, I’m charismatic. I love to dress up, I love fashion, I love going out, seeing the world. And I am a caffeine addict,” she laughs. “I love spending time with my friends, my family, and just having fun, and spreading joy in different ways.”

Her signature color is, unsurprisingly, pink. “My pink room. My pink everything. Everything I have is just pink.”

And if there is one piece every Art by Nyomi customer should own, Nyomi does not hesitate.

“Definitely the fig. It’s so unique. It just shouts Art by Nyomi. When you see it, you’re like, ‘Oh, you got that from Art by Nyomi, right?’ Everybody knows it.”

The Future of Caribbean Creativity, In One Word

Asked to complete the sentence, “The future of Caribbean creativity is ___,” Nyomi did not have to think long.

“Flamboyant,” she says.

It is a fitting word, not just for where Caribbean art is heading, but for the brand Nyomi has already built: bold, colourful, unmistakably hers, and impossible to look away from.

Follow Art by Nyomi on social media to shop the latest pieces and see the process behind each hand-painted, wire-wrapped, resin-finished design.