Thinking About Rosettes

There is the pragmatic side of the rosette -- actually doing the inlay into the soundboard of the guitar -- but there is the aesthetic side of it as well.  Beyond the actual choice of tone wood for the top, the rosette is the luthier's signature.   Consequently, I have been thinking about rosettes a bit lately, and if you'll pardon a bit of philosophy, I always come down on the side of simplicity.  As a devotee of Fretboard Journal, those guitars with elaborate inlays for the rosette and headboard, do not much appeal to me.  I can admire the skill (and it is much beyond me) but let's face it -- some are just gaudy.

Simplicity, for me, means nothing but wood (ok, and the BW perfling strips from LMI).  So, the rosette I have planned will be a simple affair, just a BW perfling line, followed by 1/2 of padauk inlay, followed by a WB perfling line.  There are two reasons for the padauk.  One, I have some scraps and off cuts that I've rescued from the flood.  It's the sort of thing that one can't bear to throw out, even if it has been soaked in pooh water, as my son puts it.  Two, I think the color complements and off sets the redwood that I'm using for the soundboards.  The perfling, with the white against the padauk, the black against the redwood, creates a border, and highlights it.  It's an irresistible combination.

Beyond that, there is an embellishment I have been contemplating.  Once the hardwood for the rosette is in place, it might be interesting to cut a channel in that, filling it with turquoise or another finely ground stone, drizzle it with CNA, then grind it smooth.  I don't think I'd want to put it directly in the redwood, in part because I think the grinding might damage it.  We'll see.