STEPHEN STEVENS GUITARS

Welcome to our web site !

We want to introduce you to our guitars and invite you to look through the Gallery pictures.

Our hope is that you discover your next great guitar - right here.

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Most recently, we have been building two cedar topped arch tops guitars.

One of claro walnut and the other of cherry.

Here are a few pictures just prior to the neck attachment.




We are very enthused about these cedar tops. They were rescued from old bridge timbers cut 50 years ago, used in a Canadian bridge and then recycled as guitar tops. The center of these tops is nearly as light a color as spruce while the wood on the edges is a dark coco brown. The binding on both is holly wood.

You can follow these builds on www.Luthierforum.com. Look for the #7 BuildAlong.

The neck is now on the walnut body and we are working on the ziricote tail piece.





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One of the big issues for the guitar player is feel. We have recently been working with an out of state customer to find the neck shape he can love to play. Currently we are hard at work making a fitting neck. The plan is to send this fitting neck back and forth to help us zero in on the correct neck for him.


We made a real fingerboard using hard maple. The jumbo frets are dressed on their ends just as we do on our finished instruments and the neck wood is Honduras mahogany. We do not use this neck design any longer so this seems a perfect use. Here is the other side.


We want to be able to write on this neck - mark it up to allow transfer "feel" information from the customer player and builder.

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These following pictures are of the mesquite guitar we made and donated to the Wounded Warrior Foundation for benefit of their program.


 
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 We have been slow to change our guitars but we have recently added sound ports to two of our jumbo sized guitars. We had heard that the sound port was intended to provide better feed back to the player of the sounds being heard by listeners out in front of the guitar soundhole. Now we know just how well these holes on the top of the upper bout really work. We have been amazed by how much better we hear the guitar while we play. Here is a picture of the port we put in the side of the canarywood jumbo pictured on our "Guitars For Sale" page.

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Here is a recently completed guitar. Quilted big leaf maple back and sides with a very fine Sprucetonewood top.


These two above are out two recent guitars. They are built to our dreadnaught pattern. The one on the left has a sandalwood body and the other is mango wood.

For those of you who have asked, all three of these guitars have been sold.

Here is the front view showing reclaimed bridge timber lutz spruce tops.

This next guitar was a fun project. A tenor guitar built to our own unique shape using grafted claro walnut.

The back on this guitar is one of the few remaining grafted claro walnut sets we have.

The other is our 16 inch jumbo pattern in claro walnut.

Then there were the two wide neck finger style instruments. The claro walnut [on the right] is sold but the other is still here.

This is Australian blackwood. Sure do wish the pictures here did justice to this beautiful wood.

These 2 mesquite guitars have 12 fret necks and smaller upper bout. The first is a true left hand version still looking for a home.

The right hand version, below,  is sold.

Following are a few pictures of a recent build  - a 16 1/2" jumbo sized flat top with cut away. Take a look.

Grandfather's Walnut

One of our projects in 2007 was the building of 3 claro walnut flat top guitars. My Dad loved claro walnut and over the last 30 years of his life he gave me quite a lot of it. Dad made furniture for neighbors, friends and family members. Since my brother's three kids grew up right around the corner from their grand parents they have wonderful memories of Grandfather's Walnut. These three instruments will be another lasting memory of their grandfather for them. This project brought back many fond memories.

These two big leaf maple archtops were a special project for me. The wood is quite wonderful and their shapes are pleasing. Sounds are warm and full.

The design and creation of fine instruments is for us a passion. Even after over 30 years of experience we continue to look forward to each day spent in the shop and we continue to learn from each guitar we make. We are driven to produce finely crafted instruments of solid tone woods that will be an inspiration for you to play.

Here is a 17 1/2 inch arch top guitar featuring our overlapping top/back design. We used a very fine set of big leaf maple combined with an Italian spruce top. The sound is outstanding and the look is beautiful.

We have priced this fine archtop at $3,800.

Ask about the availability of our other archtops.

We do have several in our inventory.

Please review the following pages and if you like what you see - get in touch with us for more details.

Stephen Stevens Guitars

1500 W. Walker St.

Breckenridge, Texas 76424

Phone: (254) 559-1143

 

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Updated Feb 23, 2010