Boxing Clever

Dartmoor-based musician David Hill is forging a living out of busking and crafting bespoke guitars out of cigar boxes. He tells FRAN MCELHONE why he’ll never vie for the big stage again.

- Fran Mcelhone

FOR THREE DAYS A WEEK, from his garden shed, David Hill makes guitars to order out of genuine Cuban cigar boxes. And for the other four, he can be found in the open air playing one of them to the intrigue of passers-by.

“I love the work I do,” the 55-year-old smiles, before picking up a guitar with sawdusty fingers and demonstrating its melodious sound. “Their beauty is in their simplicity,” he says. “Often the more simple the melody, the more beautiful the sound.

“I always have a backlog of orders. But if I have more than six, I start to panic because I want to have time to play as well!”

David founded Hillbilly Guitars a decade ago and is thought to be a rare breed of in the UK. He has made just over 355 to date which, via eBay and Facebook, have homes all over the world from Alaska and Japan to Iceland and the Baltics.