Lottonen Guitars Oy

Our small studio manufactures, maintains and repairs guitars and other stringed instruments in Helsinki Finland. We are a compact and experienced team, with shared interests of good music, musical instruments and the traditions of artisan handcrafts. Everything we do is intertwined with great enthusiasm and a big heart.

Lottonen Guitars milestones

Over 20 years has passed since master luthier Juha Lottonen set up a trade name and started his craft at Liikanen Musical Instrument premises in 1992. A lot has happened since.

  • 1993 Move to the now Arabia Pop-jazz Conservatory premises. Instrument repairs already an important part of the operations.
  • 1993 First M-model built.
  • 1994 Move to Vallila in Helsinki. Repairs as the major source of income. Orders of electric guitars increasing.
  • 1995 First experiments with laminated guitars.
  • 1997 First Selmer Maccaferri style guitar built.
  • 1998 First jazz guitar built, made of Ultra-18 thermo treated woods.
  • 2000 Laminated guitar model of own design Centurion built.
  • 2001 Move to Herttoniemi in Helsinki. Demand for guitars made of laminated and solid woods increasing.
  • 2003 Lottonen Guitars Oy founded. Move to first own workspace. A fine period as subtenant of Liikanen Musical Instruments ended. Lauri Tanner joins the company as shareholder.
  • 2004 Guitar number 100, a Centurion dlx built. First Modesto model built.
  • 2006 Move to the current premises in Herttoniemi. The launch of Copacabana Guitar.
  • 2009Tiina Kallio joins as repairman. First ukulele built.
  • 2010 First travel guitar (design by Mikko Paakkanen) built. Lauri Tanner leaves Lottonen Guitars and moves to England in order to study violin building.
  • 2011 First ukulele with brandname “Laulu” (thanks to Jukka Karjalainen) built. First laminated S model built.
  • 2013 Instrument number 200 (S-3 for Eric Bibb) built.
  • 2014 First Parlor models built.

An indication of our success is that our customer base now ranges from ordinary amateurs to world class artists. We are extremely proud and grateful to them all.

Juha and Lauri working overtime in the early years