Steinway and Sons (New York) has announced the latest addition to their Special Collection range of grand pianos – Skyline. This is something quite new, as it enables the customer to in effect “design” their own unique instrument.
Now you can have the casework of your new Steinway beautifully decorated with any skyline you like. It can be a cityscape, a mountain range, a family estate, a maritime horizon… virtually anything.
The piano shown in the photos is just one example of this genre, albeit a spectacular one. Known as the Steinway Manhattan Skyline, it features perhaps the most iconic such outline in the world. Steinway’s artists have captured the view from a riverboat cruise. The “tour” starts on the treble side at the George Washington Bridge, proceeds south past the Statue of Liberty, and then on up the East River and under the Brooklyn Bridge.
The skyline on the bass side morphs into an historic portrayal of the waterfront that includes the Hell Gate rail bridge with an old-style locomotive carrying Steinway pianos. The bridge actually crosses the river close to the company’s Astoria facility.
This is probably the perfect subject for Skyline as the body of the piano “is” Manhattan Island. But there will be countless other topographies lending themselves to the “Skyline treatment”.
One would imagine that destination hotels, in particular, would be keen to display a Steinway Skyline depicting the local environs.
The Process
The decoration – 23-carat gold leaf – adorns the entire outer rim of the casework. It is carefully applied by a complex combination of painting brushing and etching.
The Skyline branding, also in gold leaf, appears on the nameboard.
Skyline is available for all models, and Spirio, Steinway’s high resolution player piano system can be fitted if required.
Steinway and Sons will supply more information on both these instruments on request.