A Raw Electric Guitar Built Out of Wood and Materials Gathered in the Forest

Burl, the incredibly creative luthier of Burl’s Art, traveled with a buddy into the forest in order to find the best wood to build an electric guitar. Burl carefully cut the logs of maple that they collected and his buddy planed the wood to an even keel. Between the two of them using hand tools, they very slowly built a beautifully raw, but imperfect Telecaster style guitar over the course of six days. Burl even found some bone to use as the nut.

My buddy and I head out into the woods and build a guitar out of materials we collect. …I head into the forest with tools and 6 days later return with a guitar.

While Burl acknowledged that there were a couple of issues with the guitar, he’s happy with it and he plans to do some updates once he gets back home. He also looks at the situation quite logically over his choice of guitar to build.

If it were up to me the ultimate build out here would be building an acoustic but then i’d probably for sure starve to death before even coming close to finishing it, so electric to start off. 

Lori Dorn
Lori Dorn

Lori is a Laughing Squid Contributing Editor based in New York City who has been writing blog posts for over a decade. She also enjoys making jewelry, playing guitar, taking photos and mixing craft cocktails.