When I learned traditional hand-crafted guitarmaking, about half of the total hours spent on the instrument were spent encasing it in poisonous transparent plastic shell, then sanding and polishing it to a high gloss, centimeter by bloody centimeter, which in the end was quite beautiful. I simply accepted this as an integral part of a quality guitar, as most people still do. But over time I started wondering where this obsession with a shiny plastic coating came from, as it would seem so foreign to the deeper and more ancient aesthetic of a beautiful and delicate muse handcrafted from most precious old-growth wood.

Why do we like “shiny” anyway? Is it an innate attraction with deep evolutionary roots? The only thing that comes to mind in nature that is flat and shiny is the surface of still water. Perhaps, over evolutionary time, the immediate presence of still water subconsciously induced a sense of calm and relative safety, where you could literally “let your guard down” and let your mind wander away from focusing just on what might be following you. The stillness of both water and air would make it much harder for a stalking predator to remain undetected, whether in the water or on land, so it might be plausible that a shiny surface on anything could evoke to some degree this subconscious “safety cue”. A similar kind safety cue is used by duck hunters who put up a great blue heron decoy near their hunting blind. Ducks have learned to associate the presence of blue herons with safety, because blue herons are extremely sensitive to the presence of humans or other predators, and will take off immediately if one is spotted at any distance. So for a duck flying over looking for a place to call home, simply seeing a blue heron hanging out by the side of a pond would mean it was probably a safe place to land, kick back, feed and nest in peace.

With all their complexity of detail, Ridgewing grills simply were simply not amenable to the same tedious sand-and-polish finishing procedures normally used to put a shiny plastic surface on a handcrafted guitar. After taking a grill out of its mold and cleaning it up with a carbide de-burring tool, razor knife, and hand file, the fine detail surfaces are not exactly smooth. However, it turns out that they are absolutely perfect for finishing with off-the-shelf spray paint, which clings to the narrow grillwork features, fills in the smallest features and “self-levels” on a fine scale. With gloss spray paint, the effect on grills is to create a galaxy of shimmering highlights where the eye is so busy trying to take it all in that the usual finishing goobers such as drips, “fish-eyes”, voids or other inconsistencies impossible to hide on larger surfaces, become imperceptible.

If your guitar’s grills could use some freshening up, or if you are tired of your hipster black grills and want to experience what it is like to play on grills like the angels use, it is Rust-Oleum Gold #1910830 to the rescue! Early on in this project, it was realized that gold grills looked very cool, and just about every type of gold paint was tried-to see what worked best. It was found that common hardware store Rust-Oleum Gold was hands-down the best one out there.

The re-finishing process couldn’t be easier. No fuss, no prep, just wait for a sunny day, remove the grill’s thirteen mounting screws, bend a piece of coat hanger into a big “S” and hang the grill on the clothes line or a tree branch, set it spinning slowly and spray away. A light breeze helps, as it is easier to stay upwind and avoid gassing yourself while pursuing sublime beauty. Let the grill dry for an hour or so, then re-attach it to the guitar with the 13 mounting screws, string her up, and you are good to go.

Zooming into a fresh gold grill, you start to see white and blue patches that look at first like voids, or missed spots, but then you realize that they all face the same way, and are simply reflecting the sky, which is why the angels like them.