Gibson Custom Shop 1959 ES-345 Reissue Electric Guitar w/ Bigsby, Heavy Aged Ebony

A distinguished semi-hollow in its time and ours, this limited edition Gibson Custom Shop 1959 ES-345 Reissue with Bigsby is something you truly can't take your eyes off. As part of their 2026 Limited Collection, the Gibson Custom Shop revives a formidable semi-hollow instrument for the modern day with all the retro-inspired stylings to make it exceptional. Black as night and oh so stylish, this ES-345 Reissue is an imposing model for the history books.

This limited Gibson Custom creation sets off with an authentic ES-335 doublecut semi-hollow body brought together with maple and poplar. The resonant and airy maple/poplar/maple assembly makes for a bold, full tonal profile to launch everything off. A solid maple centerblock lands within this semi-hollow body to enhance sustain and defeat acoustic feedback. This whole body is wrapped in a Gibson Custom Shop nitrocellulose lacquer finish utilizing their Murphy Lab lacquer aging and wear techniques to replicate authentic age and classy damage for an overall stunning ebony look. Multi-ply binding wraps the body for a clean geometric accent.

From here, this Gibson Custom ES-345 Reissue brings on a mahogany neck in a full Authentic 1959 profile. Ensuring speedy moves from lower to higher registers, this neck travels easily and makes for an easy fretting experience. A rosewood fingerboard joins with twenty-two Reissue Medium Jumbo frets and aged cellulose split parallelogram inlays. With these two elements, the entirety of this ES-345 plays incredibly smoothly for expressive soloing and complex chords.

Such solos and chords are brought out by the guitar's electronics setup. In either pickup position, a Gibson Custombucker Alnico 3 humbucking pickup lands to recreate the tones of late 1950s Patent-Applied-For humbuckers. These rich, robust humbuckers break the mold for a full, warm tonal profile that can do just about anything. Two volume and tone controls match these pickups alongside a definite looker of a feature: a mono Varitone rotary switch that expands this ES-345's sounds even further.

This limited Gibson Custom ES-345 backs everything up with a few sturdy hardware specs. At the headstock, a nylon nut and Kluson Deluxe tuning machines land for smooth stringing and setups. Toward the opposite end of the scale, a ABR-1 Tune-O-Matic bridge matches with a stunning gold-finished Bigsby vibrato tailpiece for working deep vibrato pitch bends into playing while retaining great intonation. This limited release Gibson Custom Shop ES-345 Reissue travels with an included Lifton reissue hardshell case.

A semi-hollow all dressed up with nowhere to go, care to give this ES-345 a night on the town?