Laurie Williams has been at the forefront of experiments with new and exciting species of tonewoods since the beginning of his career back in 1992. Known world over for his use of Kauri, a hardwood native to his New Zealand home, Williams has been creating powerful, and beautiful, instruments for decades now. Allow us to introduce you to the 2002 Tui, complete with Ancient Kauri back, sides, and neck, and “Living” Kauri top. The all-Kauri construction gives the guitar a big, crisp voice which sings with a fingerstyle approach. The bass is dry and punchy, and the middle register is clean and articulate–the balance is exceedingly fine-tuned, resulting in a very responsive instrument. This guitar has opened up nicely in the last decade, and is in excellent shape, ready for action. This guitar comes with a Modern Case Company softshell case.

Ancient Kauri wood is one of the most rare tonewoods we have and a single log of it was found in 1998 with an intense figuring that resembles a school of Whitebait fish swimming beneath the water. Laurie Williams reserves the handful of sets he has of this Ancient ‘Williams Whitebait’ wood for his finest guitars. There are only a few guitars of this quality in the entire world and this is one of them. The back and sides are simply mesmerizing and the headstock and backplate also feature Whitebait. The top is modern milled Kauri and the entire guitar is bound in Cocobolo Rosewood with very fine lines of Abalone giving it a sophisticated shimmer. Laurie’s current price for a true ‘Williams Whitebait’ is $35,000 and he increases the price $5,000 with each one he makes so these are wonderfully collectible guitars as well as superb playing instruments

Here we have the first ever Brazilian Rosewood guitar from Laurie Williams. Laurie expressed an interest in building a guitar with Brazilian so we told him to go for it. The result is a guitar with his usual character and an higher level of warmth from the Rosewood. This one also features his latest bracing updates including hollowing out the X bracing for superb responsiveness. A stunning and unique Williams guitar.

Laurie Williams is famous for building gorgeous instruments from the extremely rare ancient Kauri wood found only in the northern most parts of New Zealand. This wood is pulled from peet swamps where it has been preserved for thousands of years. It’s golden color and silky grain make it among the most striking of tonewoods. This particular Tui guitar is fully open and has a big, big voice and love to be pushed hard.

The world needs more guitars like this Model E from Kathy Wingert. The 2003 “California Sun” is a heartthrob with just about anything you throw its way—fingerstyle, strumming, standard pitch or wacky tunings—and it looks great while it’s doing it. Cocobolo back and sides pair up with European Spruce on top with its amber sunburst, 14 fret neck, and Abalone appointments to round it out. The voice is very, very energetic and responsive. It has dynamic range, power, and a lot of gears, equally at home for both soft playing and aggressive pieces. Great balance across the registers, paired with crisp note definition, makes for a pianistic player that really soaks up the fingerstyle goodness. We wish this one wasn’t for sale, but could stay at the shop forever. So please, take it off our hands before we pull the trigger instead.

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One of our prodigal Dream Series sons has returned! A 2009 Kathy Wingert EVC (number nine of ten made exclusively for Dream Guitars according to Paul Heumiller’s specs) in flawless, chocolate-rich Brazilian Rosewood and Italian Spruce, this guitar is teeming with energy, begging to be played. The lightly-voiced Italian Spruce top is instantly responsive to even the lightest touch, eliciting a fundamentally tone which is complex and resounding.

Ideal for fingerstylists looking for an enormous voice and a glass-smooth, low action setup, this EVC Dream Series offers a middle register with great presence that blends smoothly into the resounding depths of the bass strings and complements a panoply of caramel-sweet overtones in the trebles. Further, Kathy has adorned this EVC with a svelte arm bevel for playing comfort and Venetian Cutaway for ease of access, striking quite the figure with its glowing Abalone-rosette-and-trim package. Bound up in a Calton case when not in use, you won’t ever have to worry about the safety of this sweet Dream Series from Kathy Wingert.