Julyan Wallis, known as the Guitar Doctor, is a luthier who joined BBC's The Repair Shop in 2020. Born and raised in Penzance and Newlyn, Cornwall, he started playing guitar at age 12. He said: "I used to take it apart pretty much as soon as I started, I wanted to know what made them tick. My friends used to get me to re-string their guitars. When I left school I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I got on a building site with my dad, but after a few weeks of doing that I realised I didn’t enjoy it - I wanted to be inside, and I wanted to be doing something with guitars."
He also runs his own repairing service, The Guitar Doctor and J Guitars, operating since 1992 in Cornwall. His work has included instruments for musicians who played with Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Eric Clapton, Grace Jones, Cat Stevens, and Harry Nilsson.
Julyan on joining The Repair Shop
He was unexpectedly asked to join the show a few years back while celebrating his wife's birthday. He recalled: "I'll never forget the day Ricochet [TV production company] rang me as it was my wife's birthday - I thought it was someone contacting me about PPI." He gratefully accepted.
Regarding his most challenging fix, Julyan said: "Every single one of my fixes takes me out of my comfort zone. One of my most challenging fixes of late was possibly the Oud. The story behind it was great, and the Oud was in such a bad state of disrepair, I wasn’t even sure I could do it. As soon as the first thing I had to do did work, which was to make sure the neck was attached to the body, I knew it was going to be a long process and challenging. It’s always a challenge because I have to make the items structurally safe and I’ve also got to make it sound good to play and feel good for the player to play. Then there’s the aesthetics, making it look good, colour matching skills and so on."
Julyan’s family life
Away from the show, Julyan is married to Bonnie Wallis since June 2002. The couple live in Cornwall. He has a son Finley who plays football for Pendeen Rovers and a daughter Ellie. In September last year, Julyan became a grandfather, sharing on social media: "September’s special event. We are so very proud of our daughter. Welcome to the world lil chap!"
Watch Julyan on The Repair Shop every Wednesday at 8pm on BBC One.
