Our third run of Soundplanes is looking good. Here are all 30 enclosures after three coats of oil finish.
There is some particularly nice variety in this batch of cherry.
Cutting the veneer is a fun part of the process, where I get to decide what part of the crazy abstract walnut grain landscape to turn into each playing surface. This is done now, and the sandwich of materials that forms each Soundplane surface is ready to be laser-cut by our friends at Gurian Instruments here in Seattle.
You might wonder why Madrona Labs doesn't have a laser cutter, since they are such fun tools. The kind of laser cutter that can do the needed cuts through the surfaces is a big, expensive, and sometimes tempermental beast. To do that work with precision takes a lot of practice and I'm happy to have it done by experts.
No kidding, my dad is good friends with Michael Gurian! Wow, these are looking fantastic. Good luck finishing these up, can't wait to get my hands on one.
I am definitely lucky to have such craftspeople to work with, so close by. I look forward to more Michael stories when I get the chance—he is a busy guy whose guitars are the stuff of legend. A cool short doc on Michael and the shop: https://vimeo.com/51647584