New Vintage Colors from the Vaults

When it comes to choosing a guitar, everyone knows color matters. And it’s hard to beat those classic Fender finishes. “Rock ‘n’ roll is fashion,” says Allen Abbassi, Director of Product Management. “Musicians are concerned with the way they look – and the way a guitar looks is sometimes as important to a musician as the sound.”

It’s no surprise our product team takes color seriously. When it was time to choose the palette for the all new Player II Series, they paid a visit to the color archives. The team paged through dozens of dusty vintage color catalogs from our paint supplier’s library before landing on four colors from the 50s, 60s and 70s: Birch Green, Aquatone Blue, Coral Red and Hialeah Yellow.

They look like classics, but the colors have never been used on a Fender before – at least not the kind we’re in the business of making. If you’re a vintage car buff, they might look familiar: Coral Red once graced the hood of a 1977 Ford F-150; Aquatone Blue, a 1954 Ford Crestline; Birch Green, a popular station wagon from 1964; and Hialeah Yellow, one of the first compact American cars back in ‘67. “These catalogs have existed for 60, 70 years and we’re still able to find colors in these paint archives that resonate with people,” says Patrick Harberd, Senior Product Development Manager. “Color trends come and go, but people love these colors from the 50s and 60s. They’re timeless.”

Our connection to the auto industry dates to the beginning. The original Fender factory was in Fullerton, California – right in the middle of SoCal’s burgeoning hot-rodding scene. Leo Fender contracted some of the biggest automotive paint manufacturers of the day and selected finishes straight from their color catalogs – including the nostalgia-inducing Fiesta Red and Surf Green. Those colors have become synonymous with Southern California in the 50s and 60s, evoking grainy images of technicolor sunsets and perfect waves, the sun reflecting off the chrome trim of a classic hot rod as it cruises down Pacific Coast Highway in the same eye-catching shade as the Strat in the backseat.

As the team paged through those dusty color catalogs, narrowing in on the final four, Harberd imagined a parallel universe scenario involving Leo at the factory. “What if he got a different color sheet one day? Maybe he had a second cup of coffee and decided to go in a different direction. We hear people say, ‘Hialeah Yellow looks like a slightly tweaked Vintage White’, or ‘Aquatone Blue looks like a more saturated Daphne.’ If things had worked out differently, we might have ended up with vintage guitars in these colors instead.”

The fact that things didn’t turn out differently – that even the most discerning collector doesn’t own a vintage Fender in Coral Red or Birch Green – only adds to the appeal. These four new colors are exclusive to the Player II Series – but they look like they’ve always been part of the family.

Check out these fantastic new finishes and the Player II Series here.