Love for music, the true love for music, can lead us to extreme limits. Like Marina, she is the player in this story. After years of playing the cheapest plywood guitar you can imagine, she was almost in the very last years of the music degree... and still playing that guitar. Then she decided to jump and go for a professional instrument. And what a leap! I guess the excitement should be like jumping off a plane in the sky right into the vortex of a storm... But in the end, totally worth it. For those of you who like to feel the vertigo... hold on tight!
"Paco, I got an idea for my rosette..."
THE VORTEX ROSETTE
Every great design must start on a scrap piece of paper isn't it? So let's start with the sketch that Marina sent me to show me her idea for the rosette. Capturing an idea and taking that idea from the guitar player mind to a reality on the luthier bench is such a journey. In this guitar the idea was a black and white whirlwind vortex. Don't ask this crazy designs on a traditional luthier shop if you want not to be kicked off the door! The rosette is made with natural and black-dyed maple, sorrounded by a very traditional square mosaic motif.
RED CEDAR
A superb red cedar top is the canvas to lay down the vortex rosette. Full of medullar rays, it is not only visually impressive, but the sound is... unfortunatelly it cannot be described with words. You will have to try it to judge yourself. A cross-over bracing between Ramirez and Rodríguez Beneyto makes this guitar play with as much nuances you can get out of your fingers. That feeling when you just caress a string and inmediatly get a response from the instrument...
As in every of my headstock, every bevel is carefully cut to increase the liveliness of the head crown
<-- PARALLAX IMAGE -->
Bevels close up. All carved by hand
ZIRICOTE
One of the most amazing woods I would ever built a guitar, period. I have to admit I have a special appeal for this wood. This amazing set just captivated my eyes and of course, the player's. The combination of shades, sapwood, spider-web grain... it is a pitty but we cannot get a decent photo that really shows this wood in all of its glory.
SIDES
Of course this kind of unique pieces have an extra risk factor, specially when bending. The absence of straight grain plus the remarkable quarter sawn figure makes the bending process way more fun just to say. Might be that's the reason why we don't see so many of this pieces... but in my humble opinion, it is totally worth it the risk of loosing a side and consequently the whole back and remaining side. And in the end, whatever makes the player happy, will make me very happy.
HEADSTOCK
The front veneer was made out of the same wood as the back. The remaining wood was so little that I had to make a special template for this headstock only to avoid any sanding... only 0.25mm on each side for sanding! Of course, the nut width, string spacing and scale lenght is tailored to Marina's hands.
FEATURES
- Top: Canadian Red Cedar
- Body: Ziricote
- Neck: Spanish Cedar
- Fretboard: Ebony
- Headstock: Ziricote
- Bridge: Indian Rosewood
- Decorations: Maple
- Tuners: Rubner gold & black
- Frets: 20
- Scale: 645mm
