Luthiers · Istanbul
Sertan Sarioglu
Luthier & Musician
Istanbul-based musician and luthier, Sertan Sarioglu (Mitre) builds lavta, guitars of every kind, and frame drums — and designs his own Modern Mediterranean Lavta — leading Tapadum's String Instruments department.
Sertan Sarioglu — known as Mitre — leads the String Instruments department at Tapadum, and he works from both sides of the music at once. He has been a performing musician since 2008 and a maker since 2015, the year he opened his own workshop in Istanbul and built his first lavta. That double grounding, player and maker, runs through everything he does.
His bench is broad. He builds the lavta and guitars of every kind without exception, and he is also a maker of frame drums and the riq. His signature, though, is an instrument of his own design — the Modern Mediterranean Lavta, an electro-acoustic reimagining of the traditional form, which he offers in four-course and five-course versions, both stocked at Tapadum.
As a player he moves between the ney, the lavta, the santur, and percussion, and that range trains his ear. A performer hears how an instrument should respond; a maker understands why it does. Sertan brings both to the String Instruments department, helping musicians find the instrument that suits them by feel and by sound, not by a specification sheet.
His way of working rests on a single rule. “In making, I have only one principle: to do the best I can, and always to make the next one better — which is why my luckiest customer is the one I built my latest instrument for.” That refusal to stand still is what Tapadum values in him: a maker who is never quite finished, building for the musicians he plays alongside.
