New archtop...Just finished

[Alexander Higgins]

Beautiful work! As a novice builder, doing something like this looks unattainable, but I suppose its like anything, incremental improvements over time. How long have you been building?

[Michael Lewis]

Alexander, if you have wood working skills you should be able to make a very nice guitar your first time. Granted, your guitars will likely get better as you refine your skills and build familiarity with the process.

[Chris Richards]

Thanks very much for the continuing comments.... Overall it's far from perfect but I am really pleased with the outcome, I read the Benedetto book form cover to cover before I started, there were a lot of construction/woodworking tasks which I had never attempted before and I was never quite sure whether I'd have the skills to build it.. Now I look back at the construction photographs and I still end up scratching my head. I learnt so much during the build and the additional skills I picked up along the way have certainly helped in all my guitar builds.

To answer a question, I've been building guitars seriously for about 10 years but they've all been solid or thinline bodied. When I see pictures of archtops people have made that are their first guitar build I'm just amazed, some are outstanding and I really don't know how the hell they've managed it! For me the experience gained on building simpler solid bodied guitars was invaluable.... But I guess if you take your time and pretty much follow the Benedetto book then it is possible for some people.... But not me, I need the practice!... I can see the evolution of my skills through the guitars I've built, I guess I'm the type who learns through mistakes! But mistakes or not it makes me so happy building guitars and I would advise anyone who is thinking of "jumping in" to just do it!