Michael Nourot was born 1949 in Riverside, Ca. He was raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and graduated from California College of Arts and Crafts in 1972. There he studied with Ruth Tamura and Marvin Lipofsky. Venice, Italy was his destination immediately after graduation. On the island of Murano, he worked with many of the glass masters at Venini.He was apprenticed to glass master Checo Ongaro who later became the first Italian glass master to come to America to teach. In Italy, Micheal Nourot had the rare opportunity to absorb the old world methods for working glass as the famed Venetians still practice.

During the summer, fall and winter of 71-72 Micheal Nourot was one of the first 16 students at Philchuck Glass School in Stanwood, Washington. As part of the group working with Dale Chihuly, Philchuck's founder. Mr. Nourot designed and helped to build the first overhead structure and furnaces there.

The glass works he founded upon his return from Italy in April 73, was located in San Francisco's popular Ghirardelli Square. The simple "cullet" furnaces at Light Opera could melt purples, cobalts, and the first of the cased enamel patterns around which the studio's early work revolved. Late in 74 the studio relocated to Benicia, where the glass formulas gathered in Venice could be melted from the raw materials, providing a higher quality result.