a fresh perspective

Amazing how a few steps in a different direction can give a fresh perspective on stuff that is there all the time......

the peddler

So this is one of the inhabitants of clovelly. Like i said, it's a slightly odd place. A recent headline from the local paper......" Girl attacks shop worker with biscuits!" "I'll make your glasses into contact lenses" she's quoted as threatening before pelting the checkout lady with custard creams. I kid you not!

little fluffy clouds

Another piece that seems to have been marooned on my hard drive for over a year now. I was quite pleased with it at the time, even if it is somewhat self congratualtory chin-stroking.

What is traditional longboarding?

When i was asked to write a "What is traditional longboarding" piece. It sounded pretty simple, it's just noseriding, one fin and drop knee cutbacks isn't it? Yet the more i sat and thought about it, the more difficult to pin down it became.

In it's original sense it's a term that defined a part of longboarding for a few years in the mid nineties. Back in the first "age of the longboard" there was just surfing and everyone rode longboards until Nat Young and chums changed things in 1966. When longboards started to become popular again in the nineties, it was driven by shapers like Bill Stewart applying the lessons learnt with the evolution of the shortboard to longer equipment. The focus was very much on emulating the "radicalness" of cutting edge shortboard surfing with a handful of throwback manouvers thrown in. The boards were light, often narrow nosed with shortboard style concave bottoms and multiple fins.

It wasn't until Joel Tudor and his contemporaries like Wingnut, Jimmy Gamboa, Kevin Connelly and others started to look backwards, sometimes riding vintage thrift store finds that things began to change. Longboarding begin to develop along two fairly seperate paths. While the hawaiians and aussies continued to develop the high performance school, Tudor led the charge back to black wetsuits, single fins, Volan and a focus on a style with it's feet firmly in the body english of the early 60's. Looking in magazines of the time, "traditional longboarding" really means trying to emulate David Nuuhiwa at his 1966 noseriding prime, hanging ten was once again paramount along with smooth footwork and drop knee cutbacks.Board Templates  closely followed those of period noseriders with wide noses and tails, flat rocker, concave nose and paralell soft rails. Once again, first point Malibu became the focus of world wide attention.

The years tick by, things change and evolve, "pro" longboarding faltered from lack of corporate support and to a large extent stayed as a fringe activity in the surf media despite the ever increasing numbers boards over nine feet leaving the racks of surf shops world wide. Tudor retreated from the limelight a little and turned his attention to shorter equipment. Thomas Campbell made a couple of very influential surf films and huge numbers of surfers rediscovered the joy in the glide of a heavy board in high line trim. From where we (i) sit today, traditional longboarding is much more than emulating '66 vintage Nuuhiwa.

 

Almost all of today's top "loggers" are incredibly well rounded surfers, riding heavy single fins in small waves but shorter equipment when the waves get bigger or hollower, be that fish, egg, hull, simmons, even thrusters. Shapers like Tyler Hatzikian and Robbie Kegel have started to take single fin longboard design into different territory. Both these shapers say they use the zenith of 60's design as a jumping off point but aim to design shapes that continue the evolution of the longboard as though the shortboard revolution never happened. They are not alone. The last few years have seen a subtle shift in "log" shapes away from parallel templates and wide noses to more pig influenced shapes with wide points pulled back narrower noses and more defined hips to the board. The lines these boards draw on the wave is subtly different and surfers like knost and kegel have started to turn harder as a result while still retaining the essence of a traditional style. Noserides have become much more focused on being in the pocket not out on the shoulder and the standard of noseriding and the technicalty of the poses struck with toes over has gone through the roof.

Far from being old and stale, a dry study of glories past, traditional longboarding is more varied and alive than ever and that's where the difficulty in pinning it down lies. In fact it's one of the most vibrant parts of the whole of surfing in current times, with an almost punk ethos of experimentation and expression fuelled by a worldwide internet savvy community and not bound by corporate ideas and marketing plans. 

 So if we must try to pin down a definition what can we say? What is "traditional"  today?

 I think it's best to think of it as an approach, a "state of mind" if you forgive the cheesiness of that assertion, defined by  some basic tenets. Fundamentally Style is important, . Surfing with style is paramount whether it's the Steve Bigler-esque exaggerated body English of Alex Knost or the Phil Edwards style smoothness of Tyler Warren. It's an adherence to the principles of good trim, harnessing the waves energy with good positioning and without needless flapping. It's working with the wave, harmonizing with it's form in more lateral lines rather than attempting to bend it to your will or slice it to pieces. It's about using the extra three feet of your longboard for it's intended purpose and noseriding the hell out of any suitable section. It's about believing a good bottom turn is far more important than whatever maneuver you can do at the top of the wave. It's about weight, glide, momentum and grace under pressure. 

It's not about being retro or being overly consumed with looking backwards, it's about taking the essence of Surfing's history and treating those reference points with due reverence but taking them somewhere new. 

Unsurprisingly perhaps, people are beginning to take notice and the big surf Companies are perhaps beginning to sniff opportunity. Vans have poured a fair amount of money into Joel Tudors unashamedly traditional duct tape contests and Billabong, one of the "big 3", just sponsored Tyler Warren  one of the best "all boards" surfers in the world and something that would have been unthinkable even 5 years ago. Whether this is ultimately a good thing remains to be seen but one thing is for sure. Style is alive and kicking.

 

boats at clovelly

nothin doing, doin nothing

Not quite baywatch is it?!

there in black and white

A slightly more illuminating picture of the bing mini-sim. Shows the fin template well which is a normal Geppy fish keel rather than a more classic simmons half moon shape. These are set canting inwards towards the stringer by a few degrees though i'm pretty sure thats builder error and not how they are supposed to be. Legendary californian build quality not always spot on then!

 Going to have to give it back soon....

i am not a number....

Plenty of you will recognise this as the view of the harbour at clovelly as you risk life and limb negotiating the wet cobbles downwards. There's a semi secret wave hereabouts but thats a different story.

Clovelly itself is lovely in a cute devon way but whenever i visit, i cant help but feel it would be a slightly weird place to live. If you haven't been, it's a village wholly privately owned and the inhabitants all rent their properties from the estate. It's an old fishing village with a long history but now almost operates as a kind of real life theme park with a visitor centre and car park at the top and paid entry for tourists.

It always makes me think of the old 60's tv series "the prisoner"............ you are number 6

les conches

Gotta love french beach break!

bob...

 

Rob Martin is one of my heros, one might almost say he's a living local legend, although he would hate me to describe him this way. In fact he was pretty reluctant to have his picture taken and i'm sure would hate the fact i've posted it here.

 

Ever since i moved here, Rob has been a fixture at saunton, on a log and for the last few years on an SUP. He's a good neat surfer with a litheness that belies his age and he's got more surf stoke than most people of half his years.

 

I really hope i have the desire and physical strength to still be surfing like that when i approach my seventies!

capsule quiver

I, like many people in recent times, am lucky enough to have a reasonable quiver of boards racked up in the shed, covering long, short and several different schools of design thought. Some are bigger favorties than others and there is a gentle cycling through of boards over the years as my tastes, thought processes and surfing evolve. I dont get to travel far to surf and riding different boards at the same few places keeps things fresh but still local in a way exploring new places does for those lucky enough to be time rich and responsibility light.

So i've usually got a couple of boards in the van and i chop and change them bsed on the forecast and my mood. When i do get to travel is when the difficult choices arise. With the usual luxury of a shape for every eventuality, picking one or two boards for a trip can be a difficult process, fraught with insecurities about making the wrong selection. A fortunate dilemma to have obviously!

Over the years i've come to the conclusion that the photo shows my perfect "capsule quiver". I reckon i can have fun in pretty much anything i'm prepared to paddle out in with a skinnyish fish and a single fin log in the bag. Much as i love the mini simmons i've been riding over the last yearor two, their super flat and foamy nature don't give me as much confidence holding in (or squeezing under) bigger faster waves elsewhere. The GS twinnie above (which is heavily influenced by the christenson school of fish shaping) is slight enough to cope with decent size (for me anyway) bowly waves and still flat and fast enough to be fun in punchy small surf.

As for having a log with you, sure they are a pain to travel by air with but if there are small reeling point breaks (or even small clean beach break) on the agenda then a single fin is a must. My current personal taste being for something a little less bulky and more foiled / narrower than i'd ride at saunton.

baton rouge

forward observation post

If you don't have young kids is difficult to understand how much of an expedition a simple day at the beach can become. If you do, you'll know exactly what i'm talking about. The beach tent, an essential bit of kit!

standing on the edge of glory..

Mike ties in while we debate if there's time for one more route before the storm front in the distance engulfs us. We made it off the slab with a few minutes to spare, thus avoiding a climbing epic tale by the skin of our teeth and trudging happily home with a soaking and wry smiles!.....

le chateau

I worked on this piece about Nineplus founder Richard Balding a couple of years ago before the plug got pulled on it. It seems a shame to let it languish on my hard drive for much longer so i'm going to publish it here, hopefully Richard still stands by what he said then! It might be a little rough around the edges since it was never properly readied for publication but hopefully it's interesting all the same!

Hasu no Hana.... 
Nineplus founder Richard Balding from the heart 

Richard Balding is something of an anomaly in UK surfing. In a scene that is
both insular yet heavily in thrall with the influence of the US and
Australia, his company Nine Plus is almost unique. While many of the
established UK brands dominate the domestic market yet fail to make an
impact abroad, Richard has steered Nine Plus into a truly global brand with
a higher profile overseas than at home. 

From humble but passionate beginnings, the journey has not been without it's
trials, it's small defeats and victories but through it all, Richard has
stayed true to the ideals he started with. At the heart of it he's just as
surf stoked as the rest of us, trying to turn his passion into a way of
putting food on the table. 

So Richard tell us a little bit of your own surfing history. 

I come from a small town called Wimbourne near Bournemouth.. I was really
into skateboarding but once I saw Surfing,aged 14, I fell in love with it
and just lived at the piers (Boscombe and Bournemouth).
I grew up surfing with people like Simon Firley, Dan Firley, Dale
Stergeous and i was the worst in my group for about a year, the one
most of the older guys took the mick out of!
I went to California at 15 with Minnow Green and met up with Joel Tudor and by 16 I was almost living at the beach catching the bus early in the morning trying to find a wave and riding anything. I used to borrow the rental boards from a shop under the pier called Waterways and
surf for hours until my Mum called me out or it was too dark to see!



What drew you to longboarding? 

Simon Firley, who was a couple of years older than me and
kinda a cool kat around town, had one. Then I saw a picture of Joel hanging
ten in the back of Surfing Magazine. That was the start
really, it looked different and I was drawn to that. I remember down at the
pier in Bournemouth, a guy hit me on his board and I ended up having like 14
stitches across my head. It was the first time Simon let me use his board as
I was so concussed and I was half like, "man I hurt" and the other half,
"man on a longboard – stoked!"


After that my Mum drove me down to Cornwall and we bought a longboard
off Minnow Green. He foolishly mentioned me coming back for a weekend to get
some pointers and I rocked up for 2 weeks, broke his board, the locks to his
van and spent 14 nights hanging out at the pub. Quite an education!

You were a pretty keen competitor back then?

I Started competing at 16 and went to the Worlds for 4 years running.  I did
all the European contests for six years while being supported by Oxbow and
Oakley.

When did Nineplus become part of your life? 
I started Nineplus at 19 and i resigned from my sponsors at 23 to do
Nineplus full time. Im now 33 and its been 14 years since the brand started.


Starting your own company at 19 is a bold move, how did it come about?


Actually I very nearly didn’t do it!
As time went on I noticed that competitive surfing for longboarding was a
love and not a money earner. It still is really! I saw that and i wanted to
enjoy the sport I love for the rest of my life so knew I had to do it
another way. I went to 'Toes on the Nose' to become their European person in
1997 but Richard Allred didn’t take my offer so I went the hard route on my
own, and here we are.
I just was like "I’m gonna do this" and had all these ideas in my head,
marketing ideas and would live, sleep and dream it and bore people with my
plans.  . I had met Fabrice Valerie, who part-owned Oxbow,  he sat with me
at Makaha and we talked it through. I  talked to Nat Young about it and
there were so many people who took an interest that I thought it "this could
work ". I kept going and slowly things started happening, like a ball was
starting to roll. 

 What
makes nineplus unique?

At our core we are a surfing company for surfers, we don’t have attitude, or
a plan other than to make beautiful products for people and do our absolute
best to operate a company that is authentic, I still have that attitude and
would leave if it was lost. We do not operate for money, we operate for
stoke and many times I will sacrifice in order to help someone feel the
love. That said we are obviously a group of companies that makes a profit
but its important to me that we stay as an independent, true to the values
that i started with.

Building a company like NINEPLUS must have involved some growing pains? 
For sure,  I started a company with no idea how to make anything, handle
finance, market a product, manage shipments or any clue about anything
regarding to stocking shops. I think the term, "ignorance is bliss" comes to mind!

When we started, Emma Skinner and i would travel all
over the UK in a car full of gear through rain, sleet and snow. We kept
going, no money, no accommodation, no plan, just cash in the dash and a
trunk load of garments. 

We operated out
of a house in St Agnes  and  each shipment of 20
boards or so coming in from California was boom or bust!
Ben Skinner and his mates would come over when they were
about 10 years old and help pack fleeces and t-shirts. Once the Shipments got bigger I would actually
tie wire around the boards that had to sit in the garden and then bring the wire up through the window and tie it around my ankle so I would know if someone tried to steal them!

We had plenty of growing pains to get where we are now, doing our own global distribution and all the logistics and paperwork that goes with that.
The last 10 years have been a huge degree course using the world as a classroom. I was a high
school dropout so its like a reverse education and having to pay now for all
those days I used to surf as a teenager instead of learning.  I've made
many, many mistakes, some which should have stopped us but we got back up,
dusted off and kept going. That’s the difference between being successful or
not, having that commitment.

Starting the wetsuit line seems to have been a real pivotal point for you? 
Definately! It's what communicated the heart of the brand through a product
that sold an image of a soulful company. We started doing them back in 2002
and they were simply to make an understated black suit like I had picked up
from ‘Mitchs’ in La Jolla a few years before. People liked it though they
were never for sale. Soon we had a demand for a product we didn’t actually
make and then had to figure out a way to make the whole system work.

We started down the whole Sheico road ( the factory in Taiwan and Thailand
that manages every major wetsuit brand in the world) and somewhere along the
way we found Yamamoto and they found us and since that relationship
developed we have never looked back. There have been issues to work through
but we now have a partnership in a small but well managed factory inside
China that we built over the past 4 years and between us  we have a good
plan I think.




From the outside it seems the wetsuits really helped to establish you as a
label with it's own identity. Where is nineplus going now?

We are concentrating on the US market right now, in
both marketing and sales efforts. California has the history, nostalgia,
waves and people that understand the ideas behind the brand. I strongly
believe that it's only in California that you are either validated as a
surfing brand or not. It sets the industry standard and is the epicentre for
our market.
Behind that is Australia which is a market where surfing is a lifestyle
almost on proportion to what football is to the UK. Then you have Japan that
look at California to inspiration and next Europe. 

Europe is strange and in my opinion the hardest, its easy to go the route of a good product and
a surfing image but its hard to have the roots that make going the distance a
reality, longevity comes from originality and that comes from the nucleus of
the market. To get there you have to be relevant and to do that you need to
be at the epicentre which takes us back to California. 

Alongside Nineplus, we've recently launched HASU which is going to be the equivalent of
Nike 6.0 in the wetsuit business. We are coming out with new fashion lines
and shoes under the HASU and Nineplus brand which is really exciting. They
are made with an environmental approach but also using the leading materials
and workmanship in the business. 

It seems ironic that a European brand has to make it in America to have the
relevance to be successful in it's home market! 
You can have success here without that but if you want to lead in a market
you have to be relevant in the US because it’s the epicentre of the industry
like Italy is to Fashion. Other stuff goes on for sure but california is a
focal point. If you can get a footing there it gives you credibility. That
to me is the litmus of a true surfing brand.


Do you feel saddened at the comparative lack of growth at home 
compared to abroad? 

Um without sounding negative, the UK is a beginners and
intermediate market as far as sales go. We have some great surfing but the
average market is quite a way behind that lead. It
operates like an island and is, to be honest, quite far behind what is going
on out there. 

The UK surf market follows, to a majority, what the consumer
buys or feels is comfortable. You can actually get quite far here in the UK
with simply a good product. That’s not possible in a market that actually
follows the lifestyle. Take 'Kangaroo Poo' for example - in the UK they
became a multi-million dollar operation with pretty much no overseas market,

They did that with a good product which hit the target audience, the British
public that wants to buy into an image. You put that in a core market like
the US and it wouldn't stand a chance. 

That's why getting a brand to
work from the UK is so hard, we are not built from the lifestyle but rather
instead try to sell from it using a perceived image. It will work well to a
non-core audience but for a true surfing brand, an authentic brand, it takes
actually getting to
the nucleus. That takes either a lot of money, being owned by an established
company with kudos or just slogging it out the
hard way.

Why do you think the UK is so far behind? 
If you have seen the Truman show then it sums it up. You work in a local
environment, see the local environment every day, take your money from the
local environment, promote yourself in the local environment and generally
exist in the local environment. In return you judge everything by the local
environment. Then someone shows you another land and tells you there are
lots of different lands but to each of them the people behave the same -
locally.


It takes being shown what exists and then becoming local to each
environment to do the same in every place.
With surfing it’s the same, the best guy in the UK is noted and in his
environment is important, this is relevant to a brand or competitive surfer
or whatever. Once you start to
realise that the UK is maybe the 10th most important market to branded
surfing goods and you venture out into the wider world, you see why
certain countries run the game.

I personally think this is part of the reason why the UK scene does not
impact outside
of its borders too much whereas other countries do. It takes something
different to export it, be it a person or a brand and that is very seldom
come by. If you are going to be another Kelly, beat Kelly or else carve your

own path -  no matter how much money you make its not success, it can bring
prosperity but true success is about being relevant, and being
relevant means your existence is warranted and if you left there would be a
gap - that’s hard to do,

What's exciting you in surfing at the moment? where do you see things going?


Everything excites me and I think surfing is in a great place. When you
travel you see people are switched on to everything and that’s good. Its
about having an open mind and people like Rob, Kelly, Donavan, and Rasta are
embracing
that.  Joel Tudor is owed a lot of respect for starting that trend,
probably 15 years ago and he is still doing it, he will continue to lead to
an extent as he's the real deal and feels what he does, He is truly
authentic, then gets copied for
it.
The media controls so much of our perceived image of what surfing is but I
think
we will see more people doing their own thing in the future. Companies have
to try to remain
relevant as this approach grows and that will be hard for many
of them unless they truly feel what they do.With the internet, people are
more intelligent
than ever and to get someone to buy into a brand now takes much
more than marketing, it takes walking the walk and that is something that
cannot be bought.

Who are your influences?

Okay, well firstly and as surprising as this may sound its Jesus Christ! I
read the Bible about 5 years ago right through. I was interested in how long
it had survived in a world that disregards everything in due course. I
was staggered how great the influence of Jesus Christ still is on
everything in our age from courts to
governments to the monarchy, its overwhelming and its worldwide. People
disregard it but if you were to equate that influence in a commercial or
industrial sense it would be and is unmatched by anything else, ever -
thousands of years
later, its bigger than when it was started and if you stop and consider that
then you can learn allot. That influences me, I think there's is untold
wisdom behind
that success, When I read it, it was like, okay so I never picked this thing

up before and I know most other people don’t either but i was dumbfounded
at the advice it gave and knowledge it contained.
Adding to that and my biggest influence is passion, I love passion, it is
what changes things  It’s the passion that I see in people that shows
me they live their dream and that inspires me. Business people like Richard
Branson, missionaries like Billy Graham, from Surfers like JT and designers
like
Paul Smith . They draw their own lines
and carve their owns routes and that is what I value as success.
If you follow the heart, there are no regrets !!





You have travelled a lot, where are your favorite places? 

Um, well when I focused on the brand about 10 years ago I thought my travels

were over and now its like i'm constantly travelling.  I feel fully blessed
to be able to
see both sides of the coin. One week I'm in the depths of
China living at a factory and the next sitting in a café in Laguna beach
with famous people,
after waking with views over Trestles. I often fly through a place in only a
few
days but I always try to get immersed in the culture so on that level
favourite places
are Hong Kong, Shanghai and throughout India.
Surfing wise its gonna be Malibu on a south swell, Rincon on a North Swell,
Hossegor on a West Swell and Rainbow Bay on an East!.


What else do you enjoy outside surfing? 
I enjoy charity work, poetry, reading, travelling, designing, sales, music,
business, investment, history, culture & learning more about the work of
Jesus and spending time with
Sarah, my girlfriend.

What are you most proud of with NINEPLUS?

Linking everything into a career that actually puts food on my
table, friends in my heart and a spring in my step. 

hello buoys........

If only i could have got closer but there was a river in the way!

 

 

Well, we've had waves!!! Really quite good ones too. Yeah there may be greyness, drizzle and wind but at least it was wind in the right direction! SO nice to get into some small clean zippers even if it does feel like the water temperature has begun to drop a little! Finally feels like the surf stoke is creeping back.

Thumbs up for logs and long lunchbreaks!

 

Had some memorable waves on the Randall the last few days. The narrow nose and hips back locking in nicely on the pockets steepened by the strong offshores. Had a few fun ones on the borrowed Bing mini sim too, once again reinforcing how good these shapes are in our average waves!
 

Now the wind is coming back westerley you might want to check out Kook 3 while you look out at the rain with your steaming cup of joe.

 If you missed the first two, it's a surf newspaper very much from the fringes steered by the very english hands of Dan Crockett and Alex Rowse. It's eclectic, intriguing and thoughtfully put together. Well worth supporting! Click here

bonne anniversaire

Happy Birthday to my little bean!

strider

Looks like it's back to winter again.......

extra pickle?

So back from Portugal after some much needed sunshine, shellfish, red wine but few waves and surprise surprise it's howling windy and raining and freezing. Time to start planning another escape i think!

The Tyler Warren piece in drift ended up being chopped up a little to fit the feature space available so i thought i'd post the unabridged version here. Nothing earth shattering extra but a few more of his views on stuff, perhaps a little bit more poignant now given the recent sad news about Terry Martin!

Tyler Warren's star burns ever brighter, his name on more people's lips, his images on more and more pages for his surfing, his shaping and his artwork.  Yet he pilots a serene and steady course through the hype, letting his actions speak louder than words with a quiet assurance rare in this time of endless self promotion and internet scenemaking.

Growing up in Dana Point, away from the million dollar yachts of Newport and the plastic personalities of mtv's real OC, he cut his teeth on the logging waves of Doheny and San O, part of the first generation of surfers growing up with the trailblazing of Tudor to follow. By high school he had graduated from heavy logs to Salt Creek and a little bit of everything else as well.

On a single fin, his style brings much of his early hero Tudor to mind, precise technical footwork and noseriding disguised in a smooth fluid style belying the difficulty within and yet there is more, a timeless bent knee trim and speed lines with economy of movement that smacks of Phil Edwards and earlier times. There may be influences but mixed together they give a silhouette that is all his own.

That same smooth speed is transferred when he steps on shorter equipment. As one of the most visible proponents of the Hynd inspired second coming of the fish a few years ago, many contend that his surfing on the two or four fin fish platform is as artful as you will see anywhere. In truth he has developed into perhaps one of the most gifted "all boards" surfers on the planet, something the forthcoming "Tyler Warren experiments" film will no doubt confirm.

On dry land, Tyler is distinct from the surfer stereotype, inspired by 50's americana with a vintage look that once again harks back to the innocence of the endless summer and before. Clean lines and good design. He's well travelled but just as likely to be home working on his new house or hanging with his girl Taylor or in his studio working on his latest art project.

Fresh from his victory at Joel Tudor's duct tape contest in Spain and preparing for his latest art show in Hawaii, we caught up with him at home in Dana...

Whats your earliest surfing memory?

I grew up around the ocean, I can remember my uncle or dad taking me out tandem on a boogie board at salt creek and taking some free fall drops down the face.  I would go body surf and body board a lot with my brother  in newport and laguna growing up.  Then next I remember my 8th or 9th birthday my dad came in with a Big black trash bag covered thing, It was a late 70's/early 80's Bruce Jones channel bottom twin fin. I began surfing at Doheny when I was about 8 or 9.    

Who influenced you growing up? do you think the quieter beach town vibe in Dana Point shaped you compared to growing up in the more glitz of Newport or the "extreme" party capital that is Huntingdon?

Yeah for sure.. Dana Point is mostly a quiet town with a lot of working class surfers.  A place where you could focus on your surfing more.

Who inspires you now?

Terry Martin, Joel Tudor, Tom Curren, My Uncle Kenton, and any one that is doing what they love.

Do you see yourself as a pro surfer or an artist who surfs?

I dont really like to use the word pro surfer.. I am a creative person that surfs, shapes, and does art.

What's exciting you in surfing right now?

Surfing in general, good uncrowded waves.  Shaping boards and riding them is always exciting and fun.

A long time Hobie team rider and working part time in and around the factory through his youth it was perhaps inevitable that Tyler would be tempted to pick up a planer. Mentored by head Hobie shaper, Terry Martin, Tyler's shapes are very well regarded and becoming highly sought after. While he is best known for his "bar of soap" take on the simmons planing hull that is just of the templates he has been developing.

where does shaping fit for you, is it something you see as taking up more of your time in the future? Do you consider your boards to be art pieces and an extension of your work in other media?

Shaping is something I have just naturally gotten into over the years.  It is a time consuming craft but it is rewarding.  I want to make functional boards that can be ridden, all types of boards from different eras and put my own twist on them..

Every era has its gems, and with modern rails and thickness you cant go wrong. I think surfboards are meant to be ridden...  Some look nicer then others and some clients want the more elaborate stuff.

terry martin is fairly unknown outside california despite being of the same generation of lots of big name 60's shapers, tell us about him and his influence on you?

Terry is a legend but the average person would not know who he is.  He is underground in a way but in Dana Point and San Clemente he is the man.  Most good shapers have heard of him.. He has been shaping since the 50's and has been cranking boards out ever since.

whats in your day to day quiver, do you have a favorite board?

I usually have a log and a twin fin in the van... The sizes and dimensions vary.  Lately I have been enjoying the first nose rider I made myself. Its 9'6'' and a good time.

what do you like as far as longboard shapes go?

I grew up riding all sorts of boards concave, v, channels curvy and straight templates.  They all serve a purpose.  I still ride all types of shapes thats what keeps it interesting.

recently you've made a few 50's inspired malibu chip style boards, what drew you to that shape and how are they to ride?

Now that I think about it.. My first custom board I ordered when I was about 12 came out looking like a Phil Edwards style board, though I didn't know who that was at the time... it just came out that way.. I asked for a 3 stringer, tail block, and a nose with a slight point, the nose came out much more pointy then I expected but I wrode it any ways.  Then when I rode for weber I got a board that had a similar look called a "professional" Both those boards had no concave.  

I grew up surfing with my friend Kio who has a 50's style clothing brand and he's always ridden Mike Marshall boards that looked like Malibu chips.. So that board came from all those influences.

What made you shape the first bar of soap? Have you refined them since?

Richard Kenvin let me borrow "Casper" the first mini simmons him and Joe Bauguess made.  I took it to northern baja and loved it at this slopey point wave. It was 6'0'' eps and about 23" wide.  That is the board that started the mini simmons revolution.  Then he started to make them smaller, and I saw a 5'0'' he made and fell in love with it. I was like "thats what I want!" I did some art for him and never got the board, but they kept popping into my life. RT (Ryan Thomas) got one from Richard and it was the 2nd white pony also in EPS.  RT let me borrow that for a few months and I loved riding it. .. It had a wide shallow swallow tail with 2 fins.. My dad was bugging me to teach this little 9 year old girl to surf that was one of his co workers daughters. So we began meeting at doheny and I would push her in on the white pony.. She would fly down the line and even go switch.. She was super light and small. She did so well on the board that her dad wanted one for her.. I said I'd shape it... So I did. It was my 9th board and I took so much time on it and I was so stoked on how It came out that I said to myself I am going to keep this one and make her another one.  That board was what started it for me.. I rode it for about 6 months then made 3 more for an art show.. I tried different concaves and tails, I kept one of those too and fell in love with it.. That was the first proper bar of soap I guess, shape # 12. My friend said it looked like i was riding a bar of soap when i surfed it and the name stuck. I rode that board for a year or so and loved it.. I still have #9 and 12.. then people started ordering them..

Is style important to you? What makes good style?

The more you do something the more you develop your style.  Smooth and Powerful Style has always appealed to me

You recently signed with Billabong, do you think we are starting to see the big companies become more aware and interested in the marketing potential of the logging/ alternative board scene? will that be a good or bad thing?

I guess surfing is just going in that direction in general... More and more people are riding quads, twin fins and stuff like that.  Its not a bad thing if a corporate company wants to help support what you love.

is competition longboarding relevant at all now?

I think the contest Joel Tudor/Vans is doing a good job keeping logging relevant.

what else do you spend your time doing?

Hanging out with my girlfriend, working on my house I just got.

Tyler's girlfriend, Taylor Simpkins is the sister of underground orange county logging legend Cody Simpkins and a talented surfer in her own right. She forms the muse for many of the female images in his paintings....

Where does your artistic style come from?

Every day life, traveling, vintage illustration, my uncle, art books, and mother nature

do you think the art world pigeon holes you as a "surf artist" or do you feel you are starting to break through on your own merits as an artist, surfing not withstanding?

I'm not sure how much the real art world knows about me or my work...  I don't consider myself a surf artist, I usually don't care to much for "Surf Art".  I am a surfer that does art so it is only natural to depict the ocean.

Is acceptance into the real art world a goal for your future

I am just going to keep working and doing what I love, and hope for the best.  I would love to show my work in a proper white gallery that hangs the work for you and its properly spaced, and they have the small red dots and little pins with #'s on them,.. I always have to do that stuff and be in charge haha.  I just want the work to be represented well. I have been very fortunate with all the places that have had shows for me.

You are pretty well travelled, do you have a favorite travel story?

No horror stories thankfully.  My last trip to indo I scored some magical waves by accident.. We went to this small island for a swell, traveled for a whole day through three airports, really hung over because I had just had an art show and won a longboard contest the night before in bali.  I puked in two airports (the airports in indo are not that pleasant, wierd smells and funky bathrooms!)

We finally get there and it's boiling hot but beautiful, it felt like real island style.  People eating with their hands, kids and old women running up to us to say hello or take a picture with some surfers,  houses with no electricity or windows. After a couple hour drive we made it to the break just before dark.  The swell had not totally hit yet but it was still over head.  The guys I was with wanted it to be triple over head!

The next morning it wasn't so the stoke level was way down. I was feeling tired and out of it so I laid down for a second and the next thing I know the guys are getting ready to hop on a boat to go check a slab wave down the way.  They said it was probably not going to be good because the wind looked like it was coming up and I was feeling over it.  Then Wade (Goodall) said "I am just going to walk it." That sounded nice so I just grabbed my 5'11'' asymmetrical and headed out the door.  I had no idea what I was about to find walking around the point up the beach 1 or 2 kilometers.  

When we see what we were looking for it's huge gaping off shore tubes with no one around just a fisherman and some palm trees.  Wade puts his bag down and puts his leash on, I do the same and follow him across the sharp reef and rock. As we make our way to the water it gets sharper and sharper and we notice the 4 foot waves that are breaking right on the reef just before the deep channel.  Wade found a small out cropping and headed towards that, he looked back at me and said "fuck".  I said "you can do it, charge it!".. So he scurried across the last bit of reef and found a small key hole in the rocks between waves and jumped down in it. As he got sucked out I hurried and did the same. We got l

adventuresintrinmucky, we didn't get cut or break fins 'cos it was the sketchiest of water entries.

We paddled out about a half kilometer to the break in a channel.. Watching these crazy waves come through. The boat was already there and Dylan (Longbottom) and Laurie Towner were already out there. We were wishing we had hopped in the boat with those guys, but we had a adventure...

The wave was one of the heaviest I had surfed.. I scored a couple good ones, a solid air drop and and a backdoor tube that spit me out.. It was a great experience.  Dylan perforated his ear drum and those guys had all surfed Teahupoo and they were saying that one of the sets that came through was like a right hand version.  Only 4 of us out and a beach full of palm trees it was the real deal!

do yo have a favorite wave?

a couple :)

give us three words that define you

Creative Ocean Goer

i guess we had better name-check your sponsors....

Billabong, Hobie, Retro Spective wetsuits

whats next for you?

I am off to Hawaii next week for a art show with Andy Davis and Jeff Canham called "Back in Town" at the Greenroom gallery.  "The Experiments" is in the editing process now & we should be premiering it by fall.  

Explore more of Tyler's world at 

artbytylerwarren.com

surf-knot.blogspot.com