One from each place.

Tannin · March 2022

Years ago, I yarned with a bloke who was aiming to collect one guitar from each continent. What a neat idea!

He had already (from memory) various North American instruments (as he lived in the US), a Takamine from Japan, a Stonebridge (rebadged Furch) from Europe, something with nylon strings from Brazil which I have forgotten the name of now, and he was asking my advice about a Cole Clark or a Maton from Australia. That left only Africa to go - he had his eye on Duncan Africa.

Not sure that I want to quite go that far, but I like the idea a lot and, from time to time, I toy with the idea of adding something from Europe (Lakewood? Furch? Stoll? Dowina?), something from the UK (Brook? Atkin? Emerald?), and of course something from Japan (Yamaha, K Yairi, or Takamine).

I'll very likely wind up getting at least two of those one of these years, and given two, why not go for the set of three?

Who else has odd-ball or different collections, or ideas for collections?

Mellish · March 2022

From the UK, I'd have to include Fylde. Never owned one but I heard one being played by a girl seated next to an open window. Best guitar I ever heard

stickyfiddle · March 2022

I do this (kinda) with pedals. Whenever I go anywhere I make a note of local builders and retailers and see if they have anything interesting, and ideally buy one from a local business.

I haven't thought about it for acoustics. I've typically thought a nice 4-guitar capsule could be rosewood dreadnought, something small & mahogany-based, something maple-backed (Gibson Dove or Jumbo, most likely), and something else (TBC, possibly mahogany round-shoulder dread, knowing me...)

enjo · March 2022

A nice idea.
I sense a big order coming in for the Antarctician Guitar Company.

Tannin · March 2022

enjo said:

A nice idea.
I sense a big order coming in for the Antarctician Guitar Company.

Very tricky if you want one made from local tonewoods!

Tannin · March 2022

But come to think of it, Tasmania is a part of Antarctica, at least geologically speaking. Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica are all on individual geological plates which move in different directions. Both were joined to Antarctica for quite a while before first New Zealand and then later on Australia drifted north. (On the other side of Antarctica, South America was doing the same thing.) Tasmania was a part of Antarctica which got caught up in the northward drift of the Australian plate and was "torn off" the Antarctic continent. This is why the Tasmanian landscape is so very different to mainland Australia, and why the rocks look so alien to anyone who has grown up on the north island.

Given that, I qualify!

One of my guitars was made in Hobart (mostly from Tasmanian timbers, but an Englemann Spruce top from Canada) and another one, though made in Melbourne, has a (Tasmanian) Huon Pine top.

So I can count Australia, Tasmania, and North America. (I also have a made-in-Japan Yamaha 12-string but it's an ancient old plywood thing not worth playing, and an el-cheapo second-hand Ibanez bass from Indonesia, but I won't count either of those.)

Winny_Pooh · March 2022

From Africa there's Fanner electric ukes

thermionic · March 2022

How about one from each of the consituent nations of the UK? In Wales we have Meyrick and Derlwyn at least. The only Scottish one I can think of is Moon although I am sure there must be others. Plenty in England I guess (Brook, Atkins…) and spoilt for choice in Northern Ireland.

prlgmnr · March 2022

enjo said:

A nice idea.
I sense a big order coming in for the Antarctician Guitar Company.

Ok if you don't mind ice pick highs

Benm39 · March 2022

thermionic said:

How about one from each of the consituent nations of the UK? In Wales we have Meyrick and Derlwyn at least. The only Scottish one I can think of is Moon although I am sure there must be others. Pleny in England I guess (Brook, Atkins…) and spoilt for choice in Northern Ireland.

Taran Guitars would be another good shout for a Scottish luthier...

guitarjack66 · March 2022

Tannin said:

enjo said:

A nice idea.
I sense a big order coming in for the Antarctician Guitar Company.

Very tricky if you want one made from local tonewoods!

I've heard the lead guitarist from Snow Patrol has one!

DavidR · March 2022

Tannin said:

But come to think of it, Tasmania is a part of Antarctica, at least geologically speaking. Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica are all on individual geological plates which move in different directions. Both were joined to Antarctica for quite a while before first New Zealand and then later on Australia drifted north. (On the other side of Antarctica, South America was doing the same thing.) Tasmania was a part of Antarctica which got caught up in the northward drift of the Australian plate and was "torn off" the Antarctic continent. This is why the Tasmanian landscape is so very different to mainland Australia, and why the rocks look so alien to anyone who has grown up on the north island.

Given that, I qualify! One of my guitars was made in Hobart (mostly from Tasmanian timbers, but an Englemann Spruce top from Canada) and another one, though made in Melbourne, has a (Tasmanian) Huon Pine top.

So I can count Australia, Tasmania, and North America. (I also have a made-in-Japan Yamaha 12-string but it's an ancient old plywood thing not worth playing, and an el-cheapo second-hand Ibanez bass from Indonesia, but I won't count either of those.)

Did you know the rainforest in NZ around Doubtful Sound and the Daintree rainforest in Oz are pretty similar in make up because they were once next to each other before the countries drifted apart? Fascinating stuff. Been to both. Ice Cream in Daintree better though!!

DiscoStu · March 2022

I would highly recommend Furch/Stonebridge if you're doing the Europe thing.

Tannin · March 2022

Indeed yes, at least I knew that in theory.

Never been to Doubtful Sound (or anywhere in the North Island) but it so happens that my father bought an old house in the 1960s. (Bear with me, this is relevant ... eventually.)

It was a vast, run-down place out in the country needing a lot of work, but in its heyday it was rather grand. Back in the 1890s before air conditioning, all the posh people built summer residences in the mountains to escape the Melbourne heat. This one was built by the Austrian Consul, no expense spared. Designed at home in Austria, much of it was made in northern Italy and shipped out in kit form, with bricks hand-made locally and some other parts cherry-picked from various other places. The ball room was huge, and internally panelled in Queensland Karri. Karri was a very fashionable timber back then but, like so many others, it was grossly over-harvested for a short time and then it was all gone. Today, it is impossible to buy Queensland Karri in any quantity. You can only get dribs and drabs of it for special jobs at special-job prices.

One of the things my father did was pull out a lot of that karri lining (14 foot ceilings in that place so we are not talking short stuff) and replaced it with modern material. But he recognised the quality of the timber and put it to one side. Years later, he sold the big house and took a trailer-load of Queensland Karri with him. Not long afterwards, like so many others, the old house burned to the ground in the terrible Ash Wednesday fires of 1983.

So all that is left of it is my father's pile of Queensland Karri taking up space in his shed. I got to thinking about that: it won't have been quarter sawn, but there is quite a lot of it and chance will have seen to it that some of the boards (those from the middle of the logs) will be cut on the right angle anyway. It's 130 years old now, so it is beautifully seasoned, and I see that New Zealand Karri is highly regarded as a tonewood - it's used for high-end single luthier guitar tops in New Zealand, and also for various other instruments. Queensland Karri is a practically identical timber. (In fact, once logged, it is probably not possible to tell New Zealand Karri from either of the two Queensland karri species. They are close relatives dating back to the time when they were side-by-side.)

Why not have a guitar made out of it?

Well, I had a closer look at the timber the other month when I was visiting, and the boards are narrower than I remembered. You'd have to make a 3, possibly even a 4-piece top. Still worth doing? Maybe. Or maybe I'll turn them into bookshelves or something. The important thing is to use that beautiful (and irreplaceable) old timber for something.

ToneControl · March 2022

For UK guitars, I'd recommend Avalon.
Basically you can get custom-shop derivatives of Lowden models, built in the old Lowden workshop, by the old Lowden luthiers, for less than standard production-run Lowdens

btw, I heard that Lowden bracing pattern was influenced by Fylde guitars
Fylde were good vale last time I looked

Lewy · March 2022

Tannin said:

enjo said:

A nice idea.
I sense a big order coming in for the Antarctician Guitar Company.

Very tricky if you want one made from local tonewoods!

And tough to maintain a guitar that was built in 0.03% relative humidity too!

tomjax · April 2022

Mellish said:

From the UK, I'd have to include Fylde. Never owned one but I heard one being played by a girl seated next to an open window. Best guitar I ever heard

I was at a concert by John Smith last night. He’s a sensational guitar player, and I’m sure anything is his hands would sound superb, but he was mostly playing a Fylde Falstaff and it sounded absolutely fantastic. Certainly got the old GAS fired up….

Mellish · April 2022

@tomjax ; - Fylde are fine guitars. I played a Fylde Oberon in a store in Leicester about twelve years ago (may have been the now dead Sheehans) and it was amazing, no other word for it

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