SECUOYA special category: The new project of Solera Flamenca


Our friend, the master craftsman Jerónimo Pérez, informed us that there was a batch of sequoia wood, which we had long been after, given the outstanding acoustic results in the 1974 Re-edition model by Felipe Conde.

This batch of sequoia wood was acquired by the well-known company “MADINTER”, whose origin is a craftsman’s workshop –who died several years ago— that was bought directly from his family. This wood is estimated to come from a 1100-year-old tree and to be cut more than 70 years ago. A truly unusual and extraordinary fact to which we must add the outstanding quality of the wood and its exceptional conservation status, due to the drying and storage process it has undergone over all these years.

We have procured a total of 50 special quality guitar tops that we will use to start one of the most ambitious projects we have ever undertaken. In this project, we are going to distribute these guitar tops to today’s best artisans: Felipe Conde Crespo, Francisco Barba, Pedro Muriel, Francisco Sánchez, Jerónimo Pérez, José A. Villalba, Sergio Valverde and Víctor Quintanilla, with the intention of being able to offer a series of concert guitars of the highest quality and exclusivity, which we are convinced will become true jewels in Spanish guitar making.

Secuoya has certain acoustic characteristics that make it one of the best woods to use for flamenco guitars, due to the shape and distribution of its grain and the crystallisation of its interior fibres and resins, which achieve a timbre that resembles the speed and clarity of cedar’s but with the sweetness and bass closer to spruce-pine’s.

Sequoia wood is a high quality wood, well know for various reasons, but especially for its high price and its size and longevity as a tree.

The sequoia sempervirens can live up to 3,000 years, grow to a height of over 100 metres and reach almost eight metres in diameter. It is without doubt a spectacular tree, a giant. In fact there are old photographs which show a small road passing through the middle of one such tree.

The sequoia has become the most expensive wood in the world, reaching prices of up to 1,500 euros per cubic metre. This tree, which was named after the Cherokee Chief Sequoyah, is characteristic of the United States. The forests where it can be found are situated almost exclusively in the north of the American continent, on the coast of California and in Oregon.