"THE GIBSON" HARLEY


In 1997, Dave Berryman, President and CEO of Gibson USA decided to build a rolling icon for his guitar company. A pro-street Harley-Davidson called, "The Gibson" was created and in the process he decided to fuse the neck and headstock of a 1957 Les Paul black beauty to the rear fender. 
After searching for almost two years they commissioned us to make the seat look exactly like the body of the '57 Les Paul. The bridge of the guitar alone required 24 pieces of leather in a 3/8" x 3" area. We made a custom bag for the seat, in order to protect the signatures of Chet Atkins, B.B. King and even the man who invented the guitar Les Paul.

"Their one-of-a-kind pieces are just truly incredible," Berryman says. "They take a piece of leather and make it a total work of art." He describes, "We wanted to wait until the bike was all done because the seat was the crowning piece. Like any piece of art, you want a flow. I wanted a seat that just grabbed at you. The seat that you look at and say 'wow,' and that's what I got." The numbers on the four tone and volume knobs on the seat's guitar body are set to indicate 1894, the year Gibson was founded. "It's the kind of trivial thing that guitar fanatics that also like bikes will really appreciate," says Berryman. "They went through painstaking detail to get it absolutely right." Berryman expresses why they were so important. "I wanted the whole thing to reflect our company and what we do in terms of custom instruments on the level of detail." "They are such incredibly kind people," says Berryman. They really listen to their customers." by Dave Berryman, president and CEO of Gibson Guitar Inc.




 HANDMADE ON EARTH
RANDY AND CLAUDIA 1989 - 2011