Dating back to the early 1900s, French
Bugatti automobiles were exotic, hand-built touring machines. Dunn’s Bugatti
guitar is made of ebony and satinwood
with a yellow cedar soundboard inspired
by Bugatti cars that were painted black
and yellow. This guitar’s body is 19" long
with a 14" lower bout. Two panels on
the back represent the sides of the car’s
hood, and the horseshoe-shaped soundhole is modeled after the car’s grille.
This orchestra-model guitar is the most
recent addition to Dunn’s line. It looks
like a traditional OM guitar, but features
an internal sound box and reflector.
Knowing that the market for Gypsy and
Selmer-style guitars is more limited than
that for OM guitars, Dunn hopes to increase awareness of his interior resonators with his new OM design.
HAWAIIAN GUITAR
The square-neck Hawaiian lap-slide
guitar has a 25 3/16" scale length and
a thin body that’s hollow up to its neck
block. This particular guitar is made of
wenge wood. Dunn’s Weissenborn-inspired instruments typically range from
$3000 to $3500.
michaeldunnguitars.com
Pricing and Availability
Pricing is determined on a per-instrument basis due to custom specifications of each guitar. The base price of Dunn’s non-resonator custom guitars is around $4000. The models with interior resonators, such as the Mystery Pacific, Ultrafox, and OM guitars, typically fall
between $5000 and $6000. The Bugatti model runs about $15,000, and the Cubist guitar costs roughly $10,000. Dunn builds around
15 guitars a year. Some of his Gypsy-jazz models are available immediately. Otherwise, the availability ranges from six months to a year.
