Through his own company, Mark handcrafts guitars. Not just any guitars, either, he's in the business of making some very special guitars, such as dobros, dreadnaughts, orchestra guitars, and steel guitars.
To begin making a guitar, Mark relies on partners, Dale and Dean, to cut the wood to a large size from the logs they acquire. Next, they split the wood by hand with a maul and a wedge. From there, they cut it into pieces of the approximate thickness Mark needs.
Mark makes his tops from adjacent cuts of a log, cutting and joining the two pieces of wood together so that they open like a book in what's logically called "book match". This ensures a matching grain on the face of a finished instrument, which is very important to its appearance.
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