Photos: See the Stunning top on Ariel Ameijenda's Next Guitar

Upon browsing through Ariel Ameijenda‘s photos, you may notice a glaring commonality in all of them. Granted, you’ll see the masterfully crafted and constructed headstock of his next guitar, which matches the piece of rosewood he uses for the back, and a very detailed, charming rosette, but even without looking too closely, you can see that the color red is strongly present in all of the photos below. That is because Ariel chose a stunning top for his next guitar he’s building for GSI.

The top is a very old one – Ariel tells us it’s at least 60 years old! Once it’s French polished, it looks darker and reddish, yet, as you can see in the gallery, the top is already a red hue to start with. The French polish emphasizes the color while protecting the wood, of course. This particular top is from a group of 3 tops that Ariel’s father left behind, and to top off this exciting story, all three tops (including the one on this guitar) are in one piece! There is no center seam that normally shows where two pieces join.

The wood was bought by Ariel’s father in 1954. The top is in one piece simply because the timber was so wide. It has very tight grain, which is classy. With this top, you have something like 360 years of growth (the heart of the tree is not present, nor is the samagus). The 3 tops resurfaced when Ariel moved his workshop to its current location in the Uruguayan east coast four years ago, and he has been waiting for the right moment to use them – we’re glad that moment is now!

We’re also ready to play it already! It should be in our showroom in about a mere three weeks, so we’ll wait if we must.