Blog

The hard part now begins! After deciding the design to include in the rosette (here), it is now time to find a design that both preserves the original it makes reference to and is compatible with the techniques and design language of the rosette. Instead of trying to translate it... Read More

Since my early days in luthery school and later as an apprentice in guitarmaking shops, one of the dreaded events was ‘creative input’ from customers. To succesfully design a coherent instrument requires years of study, practice and refinement, so what a customer... Read More

Different project, different design   Marquetry purflings   Not much yet to be seen, but recently i started a different that usual project and these are some of the marquetry parts that will go in it. It’s just a small part of a more complicated process, one... Read More

to be quiet on the website! Our second daughter, Flor, was born about a month ago; we’re delighted but overwhelmed. Time is scarce, sleep does not abound and work in the shop must go on! Read More

After presenting a few applications i use vacuum for HERE, specifically for holding parts, now it’s time to see some vacuum gluing applications. The basic setup is pretty simple: a bag of a suitable plastic material, in which you insert the parts to be glued or laminated,... Read More

At the beginning of a luthier’s carreer one starts to obsess over how to make that special instrument and where the secrets are: is that bracing the best one, are thinner sides better or worse, will a heavy neck improve a guitar or a light one will? Many more of these... Read More

Most of the time, when i finish a batch of instruments, usually four of them, i’m exhausted; even if my wife does not know at what stage i am in my work, she can guess correctly at this point. I get cranky, develop cold symptoms (from the higher than usual dust in the shop)... Read More

At the Cordefactum lecture in late may 2014 I showed some vacuum techniques I use in my daily work; the most useful ones for me are clearly related to holding the workpieces i’m working on. Key advantages, compared to traditional clamping methods, are: - Speed - Ergonomy -... Read More

The workshops of the master guitar makers of the past did not have the benefits of humidity control. They relied on their eye and wide experience of how wood moved when building their guitars. Today Daniele Chiesa still uses all many of the traditional techniques but his workshop... Read More