looks very nice, inlays are really good and the top wood is great - but didnt need 6 months to hunt down - you just need to know the right people ;)
i kinda wish it was all the turquoise colour in the burst (2nd colour in from the edge) - it just seems to be the colour that does the most for the quilt
i would describe the figure in the neck wood as bubble quilt, to me the top is a nice example of a tubular quilt
one thing us guitar builders debate from time to time. what does '100% handbuilt' mean? some people would actually claim its not unless you have used no power tools in the process - which is a bit daft if you ask me... but i would still be wary of calling it 100% handbuilt unless the hardware is also handbuilt (the pickups are i suppose.)
Thanks! It wasn't that finding this QUALITY of wood was the hard part...but if you're a builder you know that when you've got that gleam in your eye for a very specific piece, you can know whoever you want but until you find "it", you're still on the hunt.
As for the second part of things...my luthier is a one-man operation in his studio. Nothing more advanced than a dremel was used in making anything on this guitar, and all sanding was done entirely by hand. I suppose to a lot of people 'handbuilt' simply means no CNC, and I agree with that, but in this case we took it a step further. You're right in that the hardware wasn't built from scratch (locking sperzels, tonepros bridge etc) but generally speaking I consider the guitar handbuilt because of the insane amount of man hours put into turning it from a block of wood into what you see on your screen.
And for the final question, it's kinda tough to explain but here's a diagram kind of detailing it...
http://i113.photobucket.com/albums/n216/salsawords/necklam-1.jpgAnd here's a photo of it on the bench which kind of shows what I'm talking about too:
