Avalon L32-12

Having used my Lakewood 12 string for 7 years, tuned low and with heavy gauge strings, I did occasionally wish I had another 12 string that was strung and tuned conventionally. Once again, an elderly relative left me some money in her will, and I started to wonder about buying the Lowden 12 string that I had fancied years before. George Lowden had dissolved his relationship with the factory in Northern Ireland and taken his name with him. They had renamed the company "Avalon Guitars", and were still making superlative guitars that are hand built by a small team of Luthiers. Surfing eBay one day I saw that the Avalon factory were auctioning one of their rosewood 12 strings, I was happy with the "Buy it now" price so I clicked the button and bought it. As arranged, it arrived quite rapidly. Unfortunately, it arrived with the peghead snapped off completely. It was packed very well, in a cardboard crate (box doesn't adequately describe it) and was in a Hiscox Liteflight case and wrapped in bubble pack, but the carrier had managed to destroy it. Avalon were brilliant, they arranged for a pickup within a couple of hours. There was one slight problem which was that they only make a handful of rosewood 12 strings a year, and there wasn't actually one ready as a replacement. I had to wait about a fortnight for them to finish building one for me, and it duly arrived by special delivery. It is truly a wonderful guitar in every respect and I think it's great. I had hoped that I would play the new guitar in the 10th Teignmouth International Jazz Festival, but that was not to be. It has the action and sustain of a good 6 string, but the volume and fullness of tone that you would expect from a large bodied super jumbo 12 string.

As an addendum, Avalon repaired the broken guitar and auctioned it on eBay (described honestly as repaired) still with a lifetime warranty.