Celebrating the aquisition of “marianguitars.com” with a post 🙂 This is my number 74 delivered in spring 2021. Hauser engine but with an elevated neck and armrest, Alpine spruce, old Rio bridge, ABW fingerboard, Madagascar rosewood body. Fortunate to have Dragos Ilie in town for a test run.
This is a Romanian maple Torres style guitar with a rather unusual feature: a sterling silver mini-tornavoz (and nut). Alpine spruce top, sipo neck, Blackwood head, Rio fb and bridge, ebony binding.
One lattice from late 2019, spruce from the Dolomites, light padauk bridge, extra hard special Indian rw body. Raw clip before French polish, carbon strings, no effects.
Another one that slipped through, built over 2018 and 2019. This time a fan braced soundboard (Italian spruce) on a modern chassis. Indian body, African blackwood armrest.
And a fresh bare wood, raw soundclip took with somewhat worn test strings:
And I am still very very slow to update here…but trust me, working from home with two little girls in my hair can be quite difficult. I already had a number of customers pulling out and many are losing their patience. But for the record i am alive and doing whatever I can to catch up.
So, this is a German spruce lattice started in last year and finished this spring with Indian body, elevated neck, Madagascar rosewood bridge and armrest, mahogany neck with ebony FB.
And a raw recording (no varnish) with carbon strings:
Hey friends… just in case anyone is wondering, I am still alive. But life has been quite complicated, especially 2017, forcing me to neglect to update here as often as I used to. But to mention positives, a lot of work to do plus a baby (and now a second on the way!)
I’d like to show a little Torres hommage guitar I finished a while ago for myself. The soundboard is 5(!) pieces Carpathian spruce which comes from an old construction beam I split myself in true Torres fashion. Body is extremely rare bois-de-rose rosewood. At a casual look it looks all but black while strong light reveals a wonderful deep eggplant color. Bridge is Madagascar rosewood, fingerboard is bookmatched Brazilian rosewood; simple Brazilian boxwood binding, dark old Khaya mahogany neck with v-joint and carved on both sides of the neck.  Pics are complete with workshop dust. Finish is shellac top, nitro back, wax over oil neck.
I am very happy with the sound – lively, effortless and sweet. As a demo guitar it brought in several orders from people seeking traditional over modern.
My first elevated neck guitar! Â While it doesn’t seem to make a tremendous difference in playability (at least for my hands/skill) there are several constructive aspects that make me wish I had started doing it sooner.
Red cedar soundboard, lattice braced, muninga bridge
Indian rosewood body and headplate, mahogany binding
Spanish cedar neck with African blackwood fingerboard, Gotoh premium tuners.
Recording is made with just a shellac seal coat on the soundboard, fresh uncured nitro back and sides, carbon strings (fresh as well thus going out of tune)
A pair of twin 8 string guitars I started late last year but took a long time to finish as I tried to learn how to apply nitrocellulose lacquer. Â Besides these I also recently finished another two and now I am confident to offer it as standard finish for the back, sides and neck. Â The soundboards will continue to be french polished.
-lattice braced cedar soundboard, Brazilian rosewood bridge.
-intense purple Indian rosewood body and headplate
-Cedro and wenge neck with Amazon rosewood fingerboard.
They are for a very musical (and dear to me) Romanian duo and I hope to post a video as soon as they acquaint themselves with the instruments.
Edit: two live clips fished on YT after the photos.
Red cedar soundboard, lattice braced
Indian rosewood body
Madagascar rosewood bridge, African Blackwood fingerboard and headplate
Spanish cedar neck with Brazilian rosewood spine, Gilbert tuners.
Raw sound recording before French polishing.
Swiss spruce soundboard, lattice bracing
Indian rosewood body
Brazilian rosewood bridge, African Blackwood fingerboard and headplate
Spanish cedar neck, Baljak tuners.
Hannabach Goldin strings used for the recordings.
Alexandru Marian Spanish Guitars 