At first glance, it seems obvious that the red, white, black and gold woods that adorn a custom creation — nicknamed "The Maryland Guitar" — got their color from a variety of stains.
Not so. The curvy front of the electric guitar is actually inlaid with bloodwood, maple, ebony and yellowheart, all hardwoods that Bill Bellamy selected because their naturally vibrant colors mimic the ones in the complex design of the state flag that he is re-creating.
In keeping with the Maryland theme, the Columbia craftsman used a fret saw to hand cut six mother of pearl crabs for the guitar's maple neck, making the instrument truly one of a kind.
Bellamy will bring his work in progress, as well as a completed acoustic guitar and various handcrafted gift items, to his first appearance at the Sugarloaf Crafts Festival, a three-day juried event set to open Friday at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium.
Custom guitars are a relatively new offering of the 26-year-old's fledgling woodworking business, which he opened in 2010 in a one-car garage at his parents' home in Kings Contrivance.
Bellamy had mainly been concentrating on putting his personal stamp on hand-crafted furniture and gifts, in between holding down jobs as a school recess monitor and a lifeguard while he builds his client base.
"In this business you have to invest money before you see a return," he said. Earnings from his extra jobs and from craft shows "allow me to do bigger projects."
Bellamy recently finished making an antique reproduction of a Roorkhee chair, a sling-back leather chair for traveling that was designed in the late 1800s for British army engineers in the town of the same name in India, he said.
"Campaign furniture may date back to the 18th and 19th centuries, but it's not out of sync with modern sensibilities," he said of the style's clean lines and emphasis on portability. He also built a campaign-style bookshelf that collapses to resemble a pile of boards.
Bellamy says he discovered a knack for working with his hands when he was 4 or 5 and took apart his mother's vacuum cleaner — much to her dismay.
"She wasn't happy," he recalled. "I put it back together and it worked, even though there were several pieces left over.
"I can figure out how things are made. I get a picture in my mind that I can visually rotate in my head and look at from different angles. It's what I'm good at."
When he decided to venture out on his own, Bellamy realized just how much he missed having access to the pricey woodworking tools at the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship in Rockport, Maine, where he studied fine woodworking in an intensive three-month program. He had also previously studied wood science and technology at the University of Maine.
Bellamy only recently was able to purchase a scroll saw, his first power tool. Before that purchase, he relied on hand tools — and a reservoir of patience and ingenuity — to create many of his pieces.
The work is painstaking, he says, and the details on a custom guitar can be quite intricate.
"In a perfect world, I could build a custom guitar in two weeks, because I put 90 to 100 hours into making one," he said.
But he rarely gets the opportunity to see one project through from start to finish without interruption.
When he is crafting a guitar, Bellamy likes to take the word "custom" to its highest level.
"When I built my first guitar from scratch in 2012, I went overboard on the inlay because I wanted to make sure it would look cool," he said.
Working on an acoustic guitar for longtime guitarist and friend Deejay Fitzgerald, Bellamy inlaid abalone and mother of pearl in the pickguard area to depict a pirate ship floating at sea as a dolphin jumps from the waves. He switched to turquoise to inlay Fitzgerald's signature across the fretboard.
Fitzgerald, who lives in Gold Coast, Australia, and who works as an audio engineer in a recording studio, also chose the wood and body style for his guitar. He picked cocobolo, an exotic wood from Central America, for the sides and back and spruce for the front, and selected a classic dreadnought, full-bodied shape.
"It has a big, booming sound that's amazing," Fitzgerald said of his guitar. "If it didn't, it would just be an ornament to put on a wall."
Bellamy tests each guitar with a device that simulates playing to ensure it's in tune and has a rich, full sound.
At the crafts festival, he will sell such in-stock items as wooden executive pens and a cake stand with a wooden base of natural cherry and a plate covered with multicolored sprinkles encased in epoxy. Other handcrafted gifts, ranging from cheese knives to a shaving kit, will also be available.
Deann Verdier, president and founder of the Sugarloaf Crafts Festival, said she had the final say on the 250 artisans who were accepted into the event.
"Bill is doing very impressive work, and I particularly like his serving pieces in all different shapes and woods," she said. "It's wonderful to see a young person who is so enthusiastic and so talented."
Bellamy will also bring several pieces of furniture and an oversized block-stacking game that is 7 feet tall when completed, which he said buyers like to take to tailgate parties and barbecues.
A fan of games, he's made darts and chess sets and even built a 16-foot, 800-pound shuffleboard table of solid rock maple for Wyatt Mackie, who installed it in his Baltimore pub.
"It's something I've wanted for years because it's especially popular around here," said Mackie, who owns Wiley Gunters. "Bill even inlaid our logo into the wood. He is really skilled at what he does."
Bellamy knows it will take time to build his business, one client at a time.
"It's a shame in modern society that so many people don't have anything handcrafted in their homes," he said.
He says he will continue to build furniture and household accessories "because I enjoy it and because there's a limited market for custom guitars."
His advice to young woodworkers: "I tell people, 'Go make something.' You can read all the books you want, but you can't acquire a skill set without going out and doing it."