Incana is one of my older projects where I am exploring crafting wood with high precision. Limited in both knowledge and skills, the guitar is produced entirely through analog means.

The design itself stems from Edward Van Halen’s home built and self modified Stratocasters. However, Incana differs from a regular Stratocaster in the shaping of the body. Significant portions are carved away to thin out the waist as well as the section of wood used to attach the neck.

Similar to Van Halen’s approach, the guitar is left relatively rough. There is for example no tone control, there is no covering plate on the back of the guitar and there are no extra components not necessarily needed. Despite this roughness, there is a lot of attention to detail. The stable is of extra thick steel for added sustain in the tone and the mick switch is intricately soldered so that it yields five separate combinations of humbuckers and single coil pickups.

Gallery of images

Looking at references such as the Fender Stratocaster and the Ibanez RG, my guitar slowly started to first take shape on paper.

In order to make the prepare the wood, it was first planed and joined to a flat board. The board was later brought to a separate wood shop where the guitar shape was cut out.

"Tone wood" is a common phrase among guitar manufacturers. It refers to the acoustical qualities of wood, or rather, wood of high such qualities. For many years Fender has been building guitars of alder which made me excited to try to build such a guitar myself. The two images are taken the day I the wood for the guitar was delivered home.

At first try, the wood seemed indeed to live up to my aspirations.

To fit the components became the next task. Although the components were already pre-made, they still needed to be fitted in the body of the guitar. Some would say that an electric guitar needs relatively little precision when constructed, but it is also arguably so that the more precision used building the guitar, the better it will sound. Therefore I was doing my best to achieve the highest quality of sound that I could.

Still early in the process of assembling the guitar, but the wood is more or less processed.

A happy executive director of this project is watching me fitting the pick guard between the stable and the neck.

To achieve the stripes across the guitar a layer of black was first applied to the guitar. When the lacquer was dry, tape was laid down and a layer of white was applied over the black. The finished result when moving the tape was an interesting pattern similar to Van Halen's paint jobs.

The finished guitar became a highly successful instrument. For many years it was my favorite guitar and my go to daily choice.