LOCAL WOOD CHALLENGE at the Salon de la Belle Guitare at Guitares au Beffroi, March 2018
To cope with the new regulations of international trade and the overexploitation of tropical woods, the Salon de la Belle Guitare - in collaboration with associations APLG, EGB, LGRP et CSFI - presents for the first time at Guitares au Beffroi the project The Local Wood Challenge !
The Local Wood Challenge (LWC) was created for the Holy Grail Guitar Show 2016 by the European Guitar Builders association (EGB) who organize this show in Berlin each year.
The concept
A guitar made of 100% local woods : This is what each participating exhibitor will have achieved.In this project, the term "local" means that the manufacturer must use wood from his own region or from a place that does not require too much CO2 transport. It should also be ensured that the species used is not endangered.
This instrument will be identified on the luthier's stand by a tag representing the LWC tree (see logo opposite). The "Local Wood Challenge" conference on Saturday, March 24 at 11:30 am will bring together all these guitars. Pre-show promotion will advertise this special presentation to the media and public, inviting them to attend the conference, where each instrument will be presented individually.
We also invite makers to come and introduce other materials such as plants (bamboo), composite materials already used mainly for fingerboards, bridges and headplates (Richlite, Blackwood tek, Rocklite etc.) or any initiative that allows replacement of tropical timber with alternative solutions which are not exploiting natural resources.
The EGB, APLG, LGRP and CSFI associations will jointly set up a "Local Wood Challenge" stand. It will be curated by Jacky Walreat (LGRP) and will present different guitars already made with local woods. The LWC guitars made by the participants will also be exhibited alternately at their respective stands at times, rotating them between their maker's stand and the LWC one.
Exhibitors participating in the LWC will be marked in the show plan for easy recognition and location by the visitors.
And what about tropical woods?
The LWC project is not a way to tell manufacturers: "Stop using tropical woods and replace them with local woods!" If I decided to present this project at the Salon de la Belle Guitare, I want to clarify several things:
1 - to cope with the overexploitation of tropical species, it is urgent to find "complementary" alternatives and not "definitive substitutions" because:
2 - If one sector can afford to continue to use tropical timber, it is the musical sector because they consume only a small part of the timber harvested.
3 - "Dressing Paul to undress Pierre" is not a solution and if local species should be used in a more systematic way, it is advisable to make sure of the good condition of these species and their renewal in the case of a new artisanal and / or industrial exploitation.
4 - The LWC project is also educational for musicians to inform them of the problems faced by manufacturers.
It is for this reason that you will have the pleasure to see exhibits on the stands of the Salon de la Belle Guitare instruments made with tropical woods. In addition, we are proud to welcome wood supplier Madinter, a specialist in these species, and at the initiative of an ambitious agro-forestry project in Cameroon with Taylor Guitars (see Interview with Vidal de Teresa Paredes (Madinter)). The Bois de Lutherie will also be present at the show to offer local wood species.
What must the exhibitor do ?
Before anything else and in order to obtain the LWC tag to be placed on your stand, it is necessary to register the LWC guitar (s) on the website of the EGB association, who are the founders of this project:
: http://www.europeanguitarbuilders.com/lwc-instrument-registration-form/
Participation is voluntary and free, subject to correctly providing all required data collected during registration. For more information: contact Tania Spalt (email in the page link above).
Some local materials used in the manufacture of acoustic guitars as part of the Leonardo Guitar Research Project:
Backs and sides: Beech, Birch, Ash, Chestnut, Plane, Alder, Cherry, French Walnut, Poplar, Black Locust (robinia pseudoacacia)
Rowan(sorbus aucuparia), Boxwood, Oak,
Fingerboards and bridges: Yew (taxus baccata), Service Tree (sorbus domestica, other English names include Sorb Tree and Whitty Pear) , Plum (prunus domestica) Boxwood (buxus sempervirens), Black Locust (robinia pseudoacacia), Lilac (syringa vulgaris), Golden chain (laburnum)
About associations :
|
The European Guitar Builders is an alliance formed by independent European professional luthiers in 2012. Since 2014, the association has organized The Holy Grail Guitar Show every year in Berlin, Germany. This show has become the world's first luthier guitar show. EGB is the initiator of the LWC project : http://www.europeanguitarbuilders.com/ |
|
The Professional Association of Luthiers in Guitar and other plucked instruments was born in April 2013 from the will of several actors of the profession to regroup to support, supervise and develop the production of instruments and all maintenance activities, repair, restoration and production of equipment and accessories relating to these plucked string instruments. http://www.aplg.fr/ |
|
The objective of the Leonardo Guitar Research Project (LGR-Project) is to conduct a unique and in-depth research into the potential uses of sustainable and non-tropical wood species in acoustic and classical guitar construction.
http://www.leonardo-guitar-research.com |
|
Since 1890, la Chambre Syndicale de la Facture Instrumentale has brought together companies and artisans who manufacture, distribute and export musical instruments and associated accessories. It also hosts resellers, four professional associations of luthier craftsmen (Aladfi, Glaaf, Aplg, Unfi), the chamber of trade union resellers (CSMM) and the professional organization of piano technicians (Europiano). Since the end of 2016, CSFI has been a major player in an international coalition of manufacturers of musical instruments and musicians' associations in the framework of tropical timber regulation by CITES (1). https://www.csfi-musique.fr/ |
(1) CITES : The Washington Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora is a treaty signed by 185 states: https://cites.org/
|
