Alger resident Jim Frisk is in business for both himself and the service of others. The 61-year-old operates Metal Man Custom Metal Art, a Skagit County fabrication operation, and sells an assortment of sports, automotive and military-themed signage at Custom Metal Art Collectibles & Apparel inside Bellingham’s Bellis Fair Mall.
Frisk began making the signs as a side-gig to a lucrative maritime welding career, but eventually decided to get a business license and strike out on his own about 11 years ago.
“I figured that the worst thing that could happen is that I fail and go back to my welding job,” he says of making the leap to self-employment.
Frisk’s mall store operated as a seasonal pop-up store, between November and December for most of its existence, but in 2024 Frisk operated the store year-round for the first time.
Though his store is filled with blue-hued Seahawks merchandise and the various insignias of sports teams, Frisk has particular passion for the often-customized pieces he crafts for military veterans and first responders.
“I’m able to do a lot of personal stuff,” he says. “And that’s the stuff that has meaning to me.”
These pieces of art, which vary widely in their technical complexity and design, often include the names, ranks, service dates and individual unit logos of those who want them, or those of whom the signs are meant to honor as tribute.
Making a Statement with Metal Man Custom Metal Art
Frisk buys the metal sheets and then hands them over to fellow Skagit County metal artist Peter Whited, who runs a Sedro-Woolley art gallery. Whited owns a computer numerical control (CNC) machine and does the necessary electronic designs before Frisk takes over again for the grinding, fabricating, painting and assembling of the actual signs.
“He’s an amazing artist,” Frisk says of Whited.
Before opening his store in the mall, Frisk sold his signs wherever he could, including next to Skagit tribal firework villages and from a rented moving truck parked outside a Burlington gas station. Those early sales coincided with the Seattle Seahawks’ Legion of Boom days, making 12th Man and team logo signs particularly lucrative.
“Back in those days, if you had a Seahawk [logo] on it, you could sell it,” he says.
Over time, Frisk’s sales evolved to not only his mall store, but to numerous fairs and events throughout Western Washington. These include the annual downtown Arlington Street Fair, as well as the Puyallup’s Washington State Fair. The latter is particularly lucrative for Frisk, as he can make over $5,000 in a single weekend, he says.
Frisk’s metal art attracts many repeat customers, and he takes pride in creating pieces that honor fallen military and law enforcement personnel. Recently, he presented a sign to a squadron leader at Naval Air Station Whidbey commemorating the lives of Navy lieutenant commander Lyndsay “Miley” Evans and lieutenant Serena “Dug” Wileman, who were killed last October in an EA-18G Growler crash near Mount Rainier.
Frisk hopes his military signs can serve as long-standing tributes to someone’s service, serving as both a physical reminder of their personal story and a generationally-durable heirloom.
While Frisk himself never saw military service – he says was too young for Vietnam and too old for Desert Storm – his grandfather served as a Marine in World War I. His father was also a World War II Navy nurse stationed in San Diego, and encountered soldiers held as prisoners of war by the Japanese.
Jim Frisk’s Metal Art Deals in Hope
Much of what Frisk does, both in business and his personal life, is also inspired by his life’s often-challenging path.
Though he spent his first years in Skagit County, Frisk grew up and attended high school in Olympia. His adolescence was difficult: he began drinking at age 13, placing partying above his parents’ attempts to control him. Ultimately, Frisk spent ages 15 to 18 in a group home as part of the state’s juvenile detention system.
He obtained his general education degree at 16 and was soon professionally cutting trees for a living, and was married with a daughter by age 21. Two years later, Frisk was divorced and a weekend father.
His substance abuse increased after moving back to Skagit County in 1987. Frisk worked in an Anacortes plywood mill before entering into his many years of welding, but this career was paralleled by multiple DUIs and court-ordered treatment he didn’t take seriously.
“I was a functional alcoholic for a long time,” Frisk says. “I was able to hold a job until I wasn’t able to hold a job.”
The use of cocaine and methamphetamine led to a downward spiral. Frisk lived off credit cards and racked up debts, and at one point spent $60,000 on drugs and alcohol in six months.
“I just burned everything down to the ground,” he says.
Frisk became clean and sober on October 28, 2006. He still attends weekly meetings, guides other men on their sobriety journeys, and works with the Skagit chapter of Washington State Cocaine Anonymous. He’s also spoken to people at jails and treatment facilities in Whatcom and Skagit counties, and donated $2,100 worth of winter clothes to Skagit Detox this winter. In addition, Frisk and his friends have also donated some of his store’s sports memorabilia to charity auctions; a Joe Namath jersey was recently given to the Anacortes Family Center.
Now working consistently on metal art, with his girlfriend of 17 years as bookkeeper, Frisk enjoys the company of his children, stepchildren, and their combined eight grandchildren. His business has good months and bad months. But through it all, Jim Frisk is still grateful.
“I was given a second chance at life,” he says. “I’ve got to pay that forward. I’m a hope dealer now.”
