Luthier Laurie Williams | A Gallery from Nine To Noon | RNZ National

Northland man Laurie Williams makes custom built guitars, violins and ukuleles out of native timber including kauri. He is also one of the subjects of a new documentary to screen at the 2012 New Zealand Film Festival called Song of the Kauri.

Cutting kahikatea for transporting.

Cutting salvaged log into billets.

Processing salvaged kahikatea log into billets.

Violin soundboards (approx. 100-year-old salvaged kahikatea) stacked ready to be stickered for air drying.

Salvaged "sinker" kauri wedges for mandolin soundboards

Assorted bracing components, in climate controlled room prepared and ready for new projects.

Lone cyprus inlay, all natural shells.

Workshop.

Pressing frets into a guitar fingerboard.

Gluing back braces.

Gluing braces to a kauri soundboard.

Classical guitar headstock.

Tui Model with ancient kauri back and sides.

Classical Guitar with ancient kauri back and sides.

Mandolin with "whitebait" ancient kauri.

Classical guitar with waingarara kauri soundboard (this is the tree in the documentary) and cocobolo back and sides.

Tui model with premium ancient kauri back and sides, totara neck, macassar ebony binding with bevelled waist.

Tenor ukulele (Hihi model): Salvaged, figured totara back and sides, totara neck, rewarewa binding.

The images in this gallery are used with permission and are subject to copyright conditions.