Richard Sachs

A gift from one of the authors. In the 1990s, I made several bicycles for Ansel Adams’s business manager, William Turnage. The 15 or so years that our paths overlapped were a gift back to me. The man had a more profound influence on my development than almost anyone else. This was Adams’s last book project, and was printed several years after his death.

I haven’t read this book end to end, but have opened it and read pages, and looked at illustrations, and then closed it. The point? My spirit and enthusiasm are always renewed when I take note of the lives of craftsmen who have made a mark on their trade. There’s no doubt Strads have a following, whether real or assigned to them through the years by zealots.

I bought this book as an extension of my interest in handmade things, fine guitars among them. Scott Chinery commissioned a handful of luthiers to make their own version of a D’Aquisto guitar that Jimmy made for him (Scott) years earlier. The book is a bit too commercial for me. I wanted to know more about the makers, and their thoughts, rather than about the man paying them for the work.

A gift from the author. Allen St. John spends a year and then some watching famed guitar maker Wayne Henderson build a guitar for Eric Clapton. As with some of the other titles, I find many parallels with Henderson’s life, his daily interaction with his material, and how it all fits into the commercial world we inhabit.

I was a few years too late to be part of the early Dylan era but have made up for it ever since. He may have taken many cues from folks who preceded him, but the man/artist certainly rearranged it all on his own terms. I respect that.

I met Michael Maharam in 2009 when his firm underwrote an exhibition I was part of at the Museum of Arts and Design in Manhattan. From the first e-mail a year prior to the show’s opening, I felt a kindred spirit in this man. We’ve been friends ever since. When the book came out, I had to own it. It’s like having Michael on my coffee table, but I can pick him up and put him down at my whim!

A gift from the author, who is a friend as well as longtime client. I also idolize Douglas as a person, a scholar, and a mentor.

This is a typical book that made my radar during the 1990s. I thought reading about tailoring on London’s famed street would help me find my way as a bicycle maker. I found it, but this book was never the part of the equation I expected it to be.

I was two years behind Lee (Mindel) at The Peddie School. He has an established presence in the art and design world and I have tried to follow it through the various media outlets. When the book was announced, I was quick to pre-order it. The pages show his firm’s work, talk about its history, and each photo could be framed and mounted. If this book doesn’t inspire you, check your pulse.

I bought this book in the late 1980s when it first was published. I wanted more from my trade, and from the time spent at the bench, and found bicycles dull. When I started to cast a net out to try to catch inspiration—this book fell right in my lap, and has remained there ever since. Similar to what I write about Acquired of the Angels, the more I learned about Nakashima, the harder I tried to channel it into the work I was doing with metal.

A gift from the author. Bill chronicles a season on a bicycle, the racing he does, and how so much of it mirrors the lives we lead.

Ben is a journalist who has written about me and my business several times over the years. This book reminds us that everything (towns, too) gets a second chance.