Week 4 . . . Special Day

Special Day . . .

Today is the day where Richard has taken our guitar bodies off site for spraying . . . and unfortunately for him it is raining steadily which will make the job harder for him.  Patrick decided not to come across to Lewes for the day and both Phil and I were arrived at the workshop a little later.   I had a few small jobs to get on with - and Phil mostly concentrated on his neck.

A beautiful summer morning - with rain!

Jerome’s Workshop . . .

As previously mentioned, today we made a visit to Jerome’s workshop – he is the bloke who specialises in gypsy jazz guitars.  Jerome’s methods of construction are quite different both by ‘tradition’ and choice.  The original gypsy jazz guitars played by the likes of Django Reinhardt were made from laminate back and sides.  This not something as crude as ‘3 ply sheeting’ . . . rather it is three or four layers of specialty wood veneers laid up, glued and then bent into shape using a mould. 

Jerome’s workshop is well set up . . . he has made a special bench on which he does most of his work that doubles as a Gobar Box – and his whole workshop has many lights for doing detailed work. 

Workbench cum Gobar Box

Mould for making laminate sides

Walnut laminate sides

Partially braced top

Dove tail neck joint - the tenon

Mortise and tenon joint in rough state

Some lucky customer's bookmatched back

And fretboard

Guitar Paradise . . .

In the afternoon Phil and I went into Brighton to visit the Acoustic Music Company, which Richard says is the best guitar and mandolin shop in the UK.  If there is a better one I would like to see it . . . this place specialises in hand made instruments from small US and UK luthiers.  The cheapest guitar we saw was a beautiful ‘used’ Brook for £1500 . . . but most instruments were around $3000 - £5000 and some as high as £12000.  And then there are the mandolins!  The guy who owns the place said he could not spend any time with us as he had just arrived home from a guitar convention in California and he was both jet lagged and stressed because the Americans are changing the export regulations . . . so that met expectations implied by many! 

The guitars were so breathtaking that we had to have a ‘swift half’ at the Gardner’s Arms back in Lewes to recover .  . . and a ‘swift half’ was apparently a quick half pint but has come to mean ‘a pint or two’ – or something like that!

It doesn't get much better than this!

Owner hard ar work

Beautiful mandolins

A solution looking for a problem

Stunning woods

Even more stunnig woods

More Visitors . . .

It seems that Richard does not need to in the workshop as the visitors just keep on coming.  Of course Nick made some more inspections – actually we had a wonderful conversation about transporting guitars in an aircraft like I am about to do in just over a week.  Apart from his general advice of “don’t”, it is wise to pad each side of the head with bubble wrap as most cases don’t protect that area.  It is also a good idea to seal the guitar case with tape so as to control the humidity to some extent – and of course try to get it in the cabin.  Nick was also keen to know that Phil didn’t go too far rounding his neck – and came back a couple of times to take a judicious look. 

And in breaking news . . . we also had a visit from Nick’s French customer Marc who had come across for the Devon Folk Festival.  Marc was very keen to tell Richard that one of the performers was using an Osborne guitar and spoke very highly of it – even mentioning it was made by Richard Osborne from Lewes!  That’s the kind of promotion that luthiers like . . . so here’s hoping for some more orders.

I suggest you turn this over and sand using the smooth side!

Nick, Marc and Phil

Someone’s Folly . . .

Jerome’s workshop is in the corner of a larger woodworking facility whose main work is special projects . . . and we came across a ‘corker’!  Sitting in the middle of the factory is a very large structure that looks like a wooden spaceship.  It is in fact a partly built childrens’ play thing made from French Oak that was ordered by a family in the Middle East for their own children to play on in their new house – but the house is now behind schedule and perhaps the children will have grown out of it!  Wherever it ends up, it will need to be dismantled for shipping and re-constructed on site!

Lewes Space Reserach Centre

That's a lot of French Oak

One of the swing seats

Beautiful Elm . . .

Also in the same workshop was a great big pile of the very rare elm wood . . . apparently the Dutch Elm Disease has wiped out the entire population of Elm in the UK so this find of a fallen tree in Scotland caused great interest.  Two guys were busy preparing the wood for cutting into table tops of various sizes (one huge with rough edges) and bed heads for some very fortunate customers.

Where to start?

Working on two pieces

Still seven pieces left