Official Luthiers Forum!

Two questions, feel free to answer either or both!

I know the general answer to these is: "Do whatever you want, it's all opinion." but I would like to know what the "market" is saying

1. When picking headplate material, do you a) use the same material as the back and sides or b) try to match something closer to the fretboard and/or bridge? or c) other.

2. Do you a) layer your headplate with contrasting veneers to create a stacked laminate effect or b) bind your headstock according to your binding/purf motif? or c) other.


Again, I know this is really preferential. I just want to know what everyone else has heard or learned about what their customers prefer.

Thanks!

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-Marcus
http://www.bailieguitars.com
Instagram | YouTube

Usually an off cut from the back and sides unless it’s mahogany which gets a rosewood faceplate. No veneers, no bindings, only very rarely has anyone even mentioned a desire or preference…

I like to utilize highly figured head caps. A lot of it has to do with the price point of what a customer might have in mind. I have found they're concerned with figured back and side sets then what's happening on the headstock. it also depends on the overall look. lots of details to gel together. To me less is more.

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1a and 2a unless the back and sides has a lot going on then something neutral for head plate like ebony or rosewood.

I aspire to do something more design heavy but I don’t know how to bling.


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For headplates, I like when the headplate, fingerboard, and bridge all match. So, I shoot for that. I have no idea if that is what buying customers want to see, but I see it often enough on great guitars that I doubt any buyer would say "yuck, I don't like that."

I neither layer veneers, nor do I bind the headstock. I have blinged it up on past guitars, but right now, I am trying to be more judicious with my bling. I just put a regular headplate on top of the mahogany.

I take a slightly different approach. My fretboards are almost always ebony, bridges are BRW or some other rosewood. Headplate, heel cap and tail wedge all match (I’m partial to curly Koa). Lately binding is Koa too although good curly Koa binding is harder to find now. I don’t bind head plates.


Steve

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I have seen guitars all the ways you have mentioned and I have done them all also. It just depends on the aesthetic/tradition you're going for.

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Pat

One of the things that I addressed when I was building was the idea of using too many woods in a single build. I speak of creating something that is busy because we are so into the woods that we use we want to use a lot of different ones. I counted seven different woods on one of my builds that the only thing I didn't like about it was that it was ... busy.

It's also something that we see very commonly on guitars built by folks who came to Lutherie via woodworking this appreciation or love of the materials that we use so we are inclined to love them all at the same time on the same guitar. I know I was and I was.

I wasn't a woodworker when I started building and I built busy guitars anyway it's easy to do and the wood is cool and wanted to correct it so I made a rule no more than five kinds of wood on a single guitar. So with a mahogany neck, rosewood back and sides, ebony fret board, spruce top and something else for bindings, say maple I'm already at five different materials before I do an end wedge, heel cap or head plate. So this is where I went for repetition of shape and design and reused a material for the head plate, say rosewood to match the back and sides or ebony to match the fret board.

Your mileage may vary but I liked the results and so did my market. My stuff became less busy and the woods I did employ had more of a shot at being appreciated in their own rite because your eye was not being drawn all over the place. I left out the rosette material so you can see how easy it is to have seven (or more) different woods on a single build and create a busy instrument.

I suspect that some folks who read this will be doing some counting.

With all this said Marcus my head plates became either what the back and sides were or what the fret board was. This also simplified my supply chain some too and that was appreciated as well.

But of course you can do whatever you want I just wanted to share that it helped me view my stuff when they got too busy with wood selection as just that and then simplify my selections to follow some basic rules of art such as repetition of shape and design.

And this is what informed my choice of head plates, rosettes, end caps etc.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

Also wanted to add that a themed instrument can be different too. My personal OM that I built for myself in 2007 and was my last prototype of 15 is this:

Brazilian Rosewood back/sides, bridge plate, X-brace cap, fret board, heel cap, end wedge, binding, bridge, bridge pins, head plate and tuner buttons and rosette. I wanted it to look like it was dipped........ in BRW and it does.

Adi top and braces

Mahogany neck

So here is an example of a guitar made entirely from three woods and I like the look a great deal.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

On classical guitars you often see multicolored stacked veneers where the slotted headstock provides more "edges" to show them off and the headplate itself is otherwise unadorned, but is often a fancy veneer.
Steel strings sometimes use a single contrasting veneer to provide a "line" between the head plate and peghead or if the fretboard is bound will use similar binding around the head plate. Steel string head plates often have a decorative inlay or the makers name, so a plainer veneer is often used.
Exceptions to the above are not uncommon.
I usually try to find a fancy scrap of wood that I think will harmonize with the overall theme of the instrument, but I don't put a lot of thought into it.

Thanks for the input all, it helps!

A bit more context:
I've done each of the options listed before. I tend to use the same wood on my headstock as the B&S wood and then bind it.
I am trying to really dial up the quality on these new guitars and I know that if I bind the headstock it will reveal my lack of professional ability to make a miter (it doesnt help that my headstock shape is difficult to bind, especially with figured wood). So I was considering doing a veneer lamination to make it easier but I was worried that it would look too basic on these particular guitars.

I am definitely overthinking it and I am sure it will be fine whatever the choice.

Thanks again

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-Marcus
http://www.bailieguitars.com
Instagram | YouTube

Since you have a CNC, something that might help ensuring success with the miter is a plate like this. I made this one for the weird end wedge miter created by my design.





Brad


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Checking some photos on your web site, that headstock shape does look near-impossible to bind in wood. If you redesign to eliminate the tight curve at the upper left, you could do the cutaway-shaped piece the way I do the tight curves on mine, by sawing from flat stock instead of bending.

Another option would be to inlay a single purfling line contrasting the headplate wood, inset from the edge like violin purfling. It would give a visual impression similar to binding+purfling, but without having to bend any thick strips, and the miters would be much smaller so imperfections less visible. Put one layer of veneer under the headplate too, giving the appearance of side purfling.

I don't have any system for deciding the color scheme. It's an art. No right or wrong choices, but some are better than others, and you know it when you see it

I generally use some kind of Rosewood or Ebony because any fills needed on the logo will be invisible.
Typically the headstock end graft and heel cap match.

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

I started with an archtop using Benedetto's book so bound the headstock and fingerboard as he does. I've since bound the headstock and fingerboard on most of my guitars as I like the look. I had one headstock where the curves made it pretty much impossible to bend the purple heart binding I had planned. Carefully cutting out the tricky sections on the bandsaw and filing/sanding worked fine but not something I would do again at least with purple heart. It's actually brown heart now after 15 years or so.

The last guitar is a parlor, 12 fret slothead. I built it for me. It is walnu5 cack, sides, neck and top. Curly maple rosette, binding, wedge and pickguard. Curly walnut heaplate. Probably not marketable, but it is my keeper.