Franchin Meister Ede's Relic T

This guitar was the start of a friendship. The first Franchin to find its way to Meister Ede, and the reason further custom orders from Italy now sit in his Private Stock.

Franchin Guitars build entirely by hand in Italy. They choose the timber themselves, do the ageing by hand, and even the pickups are wound in-house on their own machine. This isn't a workshop that buys parts in and assembles them; it's one where things actually get built. And you can feel it in every detail.

This relic T-style was made to Meister Ede's own ideas. The T shape is and remains the original solidbody, a tool with no frills, which is exactly why it separates the wheat from the chaff: where there's nothing to hide behind, every detail has to be right. The body, the neck, the fretboard, the fretwork and above all the tone.

The relic work is typically Franchin, which is to say typically good. The finish wear sits where an arm, a hand and a strap would have left their marks over the years, and none of it looks applied. You pick this guitar up and feel immediately as though you've known it a long time. That's the point at which good relic work starts to make sense.

It gives you everything you pick up a T-style for: the percussive, wiry twang at the bridge with that lovely bite in the mids, the round, almost semi-acoustic neck tone, and in between the combination that has been standing out in mixes for decades. Add a lightning-fast response and dynamics that pick up every last detail in your picking hand.

A handmade one-off with a personal history, from Ede's Private Stock.