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About Gord Miller
My name is
Gord Miller and I'd like to thank you for checking out my company
website, GM Vintage Restorations.
I love vintage guitars. They are my passion and my business. I love the way they sound. I love the way they feel. I especially love the way they look. The delicate spider-webbing of lacquer checking... the way the topcoat ambers up and wears through to original color on the edges. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a beat up old maple neck Tele tells a glorious tale of smokey honky tonks, one night stands, spilt beer and endless hours of Merle songs!  Gord Miller with some Pre-CBS and
McCarty-era driftwood he collected at the beach
They say
that necessity is the mother of invention... in my case it may also be
the mother of creativity. I've been into old guitars for about 20
years, but I've never been a particularly "well-heeled" collector. So,
while my buddies were bragging about the original-finish Goldtop they
scooped, I was the guy who ended up with the stripped Strat with the
Floyd route! I taught myself to paint because I wanted my guitars to
look original... I learned to age them because I wanted them to look
old. I painted with Nitro lacquer because it was easy and I knew that's
what Fender and Gibson used in their glory years.
Well, 20
years have passed, and just like everybody else, I've gotten a lot
better at what I do. My finishes are a lot thinner now, and I pride
myself on being able to do really authentic sunbursts, Goldtops, and
aged Fender custom colors. I've been told by vintage dealers that my
aging and lacquer checking techniques make my refinishing look 25 years
old, and dramatically increase the value of a stripped guitar. We also
offer many other specialized services like binding restoration, route
repair, and case and amp restoration. Click on the links to check out
some of our work.
What started out as a
hobby and
passion has become a business and passion (special thanks to my #1
supporter Rick King at Guitar Maniacs!). My work is really rewarding
but the biggest reward is when the customer sees their restored guitar
for the first time. I've seen a burly biker get teary eyed when he saw
his restored Paisley Tele bass, and I've seen people go quiet as they
revisit a time when they first bought that Strat or Les Paul... a time
when cars were big, gas was cheap, and a PAF was just a used Gibson
pickup!
That's magic.
At GM
Vintage, we look forward to creating a little magic for you!
Special thanks to the people who helped make this website possible: Sean Kilback, Don Peterson, and Samantha Miller (photographer extrordinaire!) |
