The Ridgewing guitar’s predecessor Chrysalis guitar was originally conceived as a purely acoustic instrument. The tone was produced by the carbon fiber body grills transferring the strings’ vibrations to the front of an inflated Mylar balloon held against the grills by a fabric body which was itself attached by Velcro to the perimeter of the body. The membrane then transferred the grills’ vibrations to the air. This picture shows the Chrysalis guitar edge-on with and without the acoustic body inflated.

This inflated Mylar balloon puckered through the grillwork holes just a bit, creating a field of glittering little convex mirrors. To visually calm this down a bit, a piece of thin, light, glossy decorative fabric was placed between the Mylar and the grills. This affected the acoustic tone only slightly.

The above image was my first ‘shopped studio picture of the then brand-new inflated Chrysalis guitar. You can recognize a Chrysalis guitar by its pointed cutaway, which was later changed to a rounded cutaway in the Ridgewing re-design. I was already taken with gold grills, and blue is my favorite color. The pickguard is clear acrylic. And that faux-cloudy sky background was just irresistible.

In this image you can see how the denim fabric back attached to the edge of the body. As an experiment, a non-shiny fabric cover was used in place of the shimmering fabric cover, whose pattern seen here ended up reminding me of a particular stale-smelling sofa in my great-aunt’s living room when I was little. I decided I like shiny.

This visual experimentation with decorative fabrics led to removable back fabric covers used with the re-designed electric Ridgewing guitar. The Chrysalis guitar’s Ovation-shaped acoustic body kit disappeared down the rabbit hole for great guitar ideas that either didn’t quite make it, or else were way over the top. The bottom of that rabbit hole must be an incredible place to visit.