Taylor 114ce

Torrefaction is the detail that separates the 114ce's top from an untreated spruce top at the same price point elsewhere in the market. Taylor roasts the spruce under controlled heat before it's ever braced, driving out excess moisture and cellulose sugars so the top starts out already partway down the road toward the open, resonant voice that untreated spruce normally only develops after years of being played in. Paired with layered sapele back and sides, the 114ce's low end stays controlled rather than blooming outward, and single-note runs stay articulate at speed instead of smearing together in the low mids — useful whether a player is filling out a full band mix or recording direct without a lot of natural room tone to hide behind.

The Grand Auditorium body underneath that top-and-back pairing is Taylor's most versatile shape, sized to sit comfortably in the lap for both fingerstyle and standing strumming, without the added air volume of a dreadnought pushing the voice toward boom over clarity. C-Class Bracing, Taylor's traditional bracing pattern used throughout the 100 and 200 Series, is the platform underneath all of that — it isn't the patented V-Class geometry Taylor reserves for the 300 Series and up, and the 114ce isn't built to chase V-Class's specific sustain and up-the-neck intonation gains. What it is built for is a genuinely well-made, well-intonated Taylor at the most accessible price in the catalog, and the Venetian cutaway carved into the lower bout keeps that accessibility intact above the twelfth fret, where a player working through a solo break or a capoed arrangement needs the neck to stay open rather than blocked by an uncut body.

The clearest comparison inside the 100 Series is the 114ce set against its own sibling, the 117e. Both share the identical torrefied spruce top, layered sapele back and sides, C-Class Bracing, and $799 price, so the entire difference between them comes down to body shape. The 114ce's Grand Auditorium stays balanced and controlled, with the cutaway keeping the upper frets open. The 117e swaps that for the Grand Pacific, Taylor's round-shouldered dreadnought shape and, per Taylor, the most powerful and robust body it builds — more low-end push and volume under a full strum, at the cost of the cutaway and some of the Grand Auditorium's evenness across the neck. Neither is a better guitar than the other; a player choosing between the two is choosing a playing style and a voice, not paying more for a categorically superior instrument. A fingerstyle player or anyone soloing past the twelfth fret is better served by the 114ce; a strummer chasing low-end weight and volume is better served by the 117e.

Every Taylor that leaves The Acoustic Shoppe completes the same full 23-Point Professional Inspection our in-house techs run on every instrument we sell, regardless of price point or series tier — this is a genuine pre-sale quality check, not a routine setup. At $799, the 114ce sits well under our $1,000 Dread-Not Guarantee threshold, so it doesn't carry the full guarantee package (the 30-day in-home trial, 1-year 90% trade-in credit, and free humidity monitoring kit reserved for instruments at $1,000 and up), but it still ships only after that complete inspection has cleared, and our team is glad to walk through what that inspection covers before you buy.

For the rest of the line, see our Taylor 100 Series collection, and for the complete range of Taylor models we carry, visit our Taylor Guitars collection.

The Acoustic Shoppe is an Authorized Taylor Premier Dealer and Gold Label Advantage Dealer. Every instrument ships after a full 23-point professional inspection by our in-house repair tech. As a nine-time consecutive NAMM Top 100 Dealer, we handle warranty concerns directly on your behalf.