His first Irish studio/workshop, in 6a High Street, Bangor[4] employed four trainee guitar makers, Colin ‘Dusty’ Miller, Frank Kernaghan, Sam Irwin and Michael Hull.

Beginning in 1980, Lowden licensed manufacturing of his guitars to a small group of master luthiers in Japan, near Nagoya.

[2] In 1985, as a result of the rise in interest for all electronic instruments in music, sales of acoustic instruments slumped worldwide and the owners of the Japanese factory decided to close it and move production of Lowden guitars to a larger factory where other rival brands were made.

With little capital and through the help of an investor (David Jebb), he rented a building in the Balloo Industrial Estate in Bangor, County Down and began to employ and train new craftsmen.

The acoustic guitar market had begun to flourish again during the 1990s, but the company, significantly hampered by under-investment, had not been able to achieve its potential.

[6] Among the artists who have played Lowden guitars have been Damien Rice, Jan Akkerman, Pierre Bensusan, David Gray, Michael Hedges, Jacques Stotzem, Richard Thompson, Luka Bloom, Dermot Kennedy, Niall Horan and Ed Sheeran.