Nerdanel was a sculptor of great note and is said to have made statues so lifelike that people thought them to be the real thing. During the earlier times of Nerdanel's marriage to Fëanor, her father Mahtan, a Noldorin smith among those of the Noldor who was in service to Aulë, tutored his daughter Nerdanel's husband, Fëanor in the making of things in metal and in stone.