Juha studied lutherie in the early 90’s under the guidance of finest Finnish luthiers. He graduated as guitarmaker artisan from Ikaalinen College of Arts and Design in 1995, and founded Ruokangas Guitars the same year. The first years passed by doing repairs, building one-off custom guitars and working on the first original Ruokangas designs.

By 2012 Juha has unveiled five original design guitar models – Duke (1997), VSOP (2001), Mojo (2003), Hellcat (2007) and Unicorn (2009). In 2011 Juha launched finally the long awaited Ruokangas electric bass named the Steambass. The total of Ruokangas instruments shipped around the world exceeds 900 pieces.

Besides making guitars, Juha lets out the steam playing guitar in a 70’s influenced rock band Tadalang. With the band his main guitars are the Unicorn #1, Duke #1 and Mojo King #1, which are the core of his small private guitar collection. Juha and Emma also have a duet, gigging sometimes locally at friends’ parties. With the duet, Juha plays mainly a dreadnought acoustic guitar built by Emma.

Juha is one of Finland’s very few luthiers with Master’s Degree. He is also the chairman of the board of The Guild of Finnish Luthiers."

http://www.ruokangas.com