Archive for the ‘ Factory Tours ’ Category
The Twelfth Fret Video Tour
Saturday, August 20th, 2011
Recently Grant did a couple of tours of our shop. Here are two versions of it, one about two minutes and the other, in more detail, about ten minutes. Hope you enjoy it! Here’s the Two Minute Tour: And the Ten Minute Tour. And here are a few still photos from the shop.
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 6
Tuesday, June 21st, 2011
So far, we’ve looked at the production process and the Custom Shop at Gibson in Bozeman. Now, we’ll take a last look at the artist models that are designed and produced here. Artist models are usually made after consulting with the artist, who specifies particular features that suit their needs, playing styles, and tonal and [...]
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 5
Tuesday, June 21st, 2011
We’ve followed the complete process of acoustic guitar construction at the Gibson acoustic shop. There are two other key aspects, however: the Custom Shop and Artist models. Here, we’ll take a look inside the Bozeman Custom Shop. The Custom Shop is big enough to work on no more than a few guitars at once. It [...]
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 4
Thursday, June 9th, 2011
We’ve followed along the path various pieces of wood take to become a Gibson acoustic guitar. We’re finally ready to leave the woodshop floor and cross the hall to the finishing areas. At this point, the guitar body and neck are fitted and glued, the assembly has been sanded, and if it’s a mahogany or [...]
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 3
Wednesday, June 8th, 2011
And now we’re back with the rest of the tour of the wood shop floor. At this point, the basic guitar body has been assembled – the tops and backs are joined and strutted, the sides are bent and glued up with the neck and tail blocks, and these parts have been put together. As [...]
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 2
Tuesday, June 7th, 2011
In the morning we made our way over to the Gibson shop. It’s located in an unassuming building in Bozeman, Montana, at 1894 Orville Way. By an odd coincidence, 1894 is also the year Orville Gibson went into business. After an introductory meeting, we headed down to the shop floor. First stop is at the [...]
A Tour of the Gibson Acoustic Shop in Bozeman, Montana: Part 1
Monday, June 6th, 2011
Every once in a while, an opportunity arises to tour a guitar maker’s shop, and see up close how things are done and what they’re working on – things which may never be seen anywhere else. This week we’re taking a tour of the Gibson Acoustic shop in Bozeman, Montana. First off, Montana is beautiful [...]
Taylor BTO Guitars
Wednesday, March 30th, 2011
Taylor’s Build-to-Order program allows any guitar player, anywhere in the world, to design their very own customized ‘dream guitar’, at a fraction of the cost of most custom instruments. Choose your wood sets, body style, inlay package, binding details, and much more. Here at the 12th Fret, many of the Taylor guitars you will see [...]
Gibson Factory Tours – Nashville and Memphis
Monday, March 28th, 2011
On April 25th 2010, I flew to Nashville along with 13 other Canadians to visit Gibson Guitars. Our group was assembled and led by Jeff Cowling and Jeremy Berger of Yorkville Sound; the Canadian distributor for Gibson. Over the next 4 days, our group would visit Gibson USA, Epiphone USA, Gibson Custom in Nashville, and [...]
Guild Factory Tour 2009
Sunday, December 26th, 2010
Guild Factory Trip: How I spent my weekend ! Last month I got a special one-time opportunity to see the Guild guitar factory in New Hartford Connecticut. The Fender Guitar Co flew a number of their Guild dealers to the factory for this incredible opportunity to see the original plant. After long airport delays at [...]
Taylor University 2010
Thursday, December 16th, 2010
In the spirit of full disclosure, I would like to state from the beginning that not once on this trip did I use a recording device to capture what was being said by Bob Taylor or his employees…. any quotes from here on in are based purely on my (questionable) memory. I tried really hard [...]