Okay, we love guitars. Mostly it’s the sound
and the feel and what they allow us to
express and achieve. But sometimes it’s their
beauty that first captures our imaginations
and our hearts. Fine craftsmanship is only
the beginning in this golden age of lutherie;
most guitars being made now have a better
fit and finish than ever before. But the
tantalizing and mysterious arts of fine inlay
and marquetry have in recent years entered
a golden age of their own, making already
gorgeous instruments beyond drool-worthy.
There are two ways to do inlay: hand-cutting
and CNC; marquetry is done strictly by hand.
The process begins very much the same
either way: a customer calls with a commission
or an idea, and there is a conversation
about what they want, how much they want
to spend and when they want to see it.
A discussion is had about materials to be
inlaid, whether it’s abalone, paua, laminate
sheets, plastic, glitter, diamond chips, rare
woods—it’s almost all fair game, and artists
are increasingly willing to mix and match the
commonplace with the lowly or the exotic in
order to make a project work.
These artists are putting guitars in the same
context as other visual arts to create gallery-worthy
pieces that remain uncompromisingly
playable and listenable. Meet
Harvey Leach,
Larry Robinson and
Judy Threet, three
hand-inlay artists;
David Petillo, a marquetry
artist, and
Tom Ellis, one of the pioneers of
the CNC inlay process and the founder of
Precision Pearl.