Canowindra High School students Raphael Cuddy and Samuel Bullock have had their woodworking major projects recognised in the 2024 Maker of the Year Awards.
Samuel Bullock created a foosball table which received a highly commended at the Maker of the Year Awards.
For his Les Paul style guitar, Raphael was placed in the top 100 of the awards, and had his work featured in the December issue of the Australian Wood Review magazine.
They were entered into the student category of the Maker of the Year Awards, which was open to high school and tertiary students from around Australia and the world.
Raphael crafted his guitar in the style of a Les Paul, with the body and neck made of mahogany with a maple body cap and an ebony fret board.
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Raphael said it feels pretty good and validating that his hard work was recognised in the Maker of the Year awards, and that it placed at number 15.
He said he has been interested in guitar making for quite some time and was inspired by Jackson Stacey's major work in 2022 where he made a Stratocaster style guitar
"I kind of wanted to take it a step further and make a Les Paul, which is a bit more of a complicated project," he said.
While they were given a year to finish their major work, Raphael said he spent more than half of that time trying to plan and get the right materials together which was difficult.
Raphael said a lot of the wood was hard to find to the quality needed for a guitar and he had to look specifically, particularly for the timber on the body cap.
"I had a pretty specific idea of what I wanted, which was this figured maple. It took me quite a few months and I accidently bought the wrong one at one point and had to return it to get what I wanted," he said.
Raphael said there was a lot of problem solving in terms of the planning of the fabrication of the guitar, and got a lot of help from the careers advisor, Mr Conliffe in making templates to cut the timber to the right shapes.
He said he would also like to say a special thanks to his teachers Mr Roberts and Mr Conliffe for their support, as well as Ben Lyons from Landers Music in Orange who did the electronics for the guitar.
Looking forward, he said making this major work has given him an interest in lute making and the role of a guitar technician.
Samuel said he started his project in October of last year and finished it in July of this year, making the foosball table out of Australian native Jarrah wood and Cyprus wood.
Samuel said he organised it so one team was made out of Jarrah wood and the opposing team was made out of Cyprus wood.
He also included grass for the line of the field and flanges on the outside.
Samuel said he chose to create a foosball table for his major project as he wanted to create something large, challenging and a big project.
"I haven't done a project this big before and IO wanted something you could play as well, something functional," he said.
He said he liked to have aesthetic and functional aspects to his projects.
Samuel said it feels really rewarding to receive the highly commended award for his project and coming from a small country high school it is a big achievement.
Samuel has also been nominated to go to the SHAPE exhibition in Sydney next year for his project.
