A most unexpected treat!

One of my dearest friends and favorite people in the world, Zac Childs, invited me to accompany him to the Gibson Custom Shop a while back, to help him pick out his newest guitar, a 1959 VOS Gibson Les Paul. Now let me clarify what I mean by “help him.” Zac knew exactly what he wanted and the color he wanted, so he basically needed an assistant, to help record data about the dozens of Les Pauls we went through that day before finding the one. He also knew I would be like a kid in a candy store, and that I would love the experience just as much as him. 

Steve Christmas, the guy at the custom shop that was helping us, was incredibly gracious to us, and very helpful in showing us the locations of all the guitars we had to find, according to the numbers on a clipboard he provided, that I was in charge of managing. So once we found a guitar, Zac inspected and played it for a bit, weighed it on a digital scale, examined the top for the amount of flame in the Maple, and then went on to the next one, and we did this about 2 dozen times until we found the one.

As a most unexpected treat while Zac’s paperwork was being processed, Steve offered to give us a private tour of the Custom Shop Factory! What is significant about this is that Gibson does not do tours here—of the custom shop or the Gibson USA plant, so this was very special. I was freaking out inside! If you want to see some photos of our experience, go here and check them out. These are all Zac’s photos, and all photography is by Zac, unless he is in it, then it’s me taking a few of him during his special day.