Greetings, Shredderz! Let’s cut the small talk and get to it, shall we? Keep reading for some surf vids I’ve recently discovered and/or enjoyed.
Skip Frye Drone Footage
This is a simple, modest little edit but I got such a huge thrill out of it. I think drone cinematography can get a little out of hand at times, but I love the way the aerial footage complements Skip’s timeless lines. There’s something striking about that big yellow board against the backdrop of the ocean on a mellow, uncrowded day.
“A State of Play” by Drew McPherson / Nathan Henshaw
Need Essentials are the folks behind the excellent Torren Martyn edits you’ve probably seen recently. (For what it’s worth, Martyn also got a big feature in the latest issue of The Surfer’s Journal, which is definitely worth a read.) Here, surfer Drew McPherson explores some lesser-known Aussie lineups. I particularly dig the footage with the blue mid-length board.
Beau Cram for O’Riginals
Speaking of Aussies, does anyone do slang better than our friends south of the equator? The caption for this video, which was released as part of O’Neill’s new “O’Riginals” series, describes Beau Cram as “the son of Eighties power mongrel Richard Cram.” Sadly, my below-average surfing means no one will ever describe me as a power mongrel, but this cool little edit helps ease the pain a bit. I like the J Bay portion, where Cram rides a sweet 6’8″ Christenson Surfboards Long Phish through some classic conditions.
Vans Duct Tape Invitational New York by Stab Magazine
By all accounts this fall has been an epic one for New York surfing. As an Empire State native turned California transplant, I’m always looking for an excuse to shine the spotlight on the East Coast. Joel Tudor and Vans’ Duct Tape Invitational came to Rockaway Beach in between epic swells, and the video above spotlights some of the contestants and their shapes. It’s a cool look at an eclectic and talented crowd with equipment to match.
Greetings, Shredderz! I’d like to welcome all of you to a brand spanking new series on the blog, titled “Shaper Spotlight.” Up until now, this humble blog has focused mostly on vintage surfboards. I think it’s also important to profile contemporary shapers who are building boards today. There’s a ton of rich history found in older surfboards, and that will always be a big part of Shred Sledz. That said, there’s only one way to ensure hand shaped surfboards continue to get their due, and that’s by supporting the talented craftsmen who build them.
Last month I took my first ever trip to Oahu, and during that time I was lucky enough to meet up with Todd Pinder, the man behind Surfboards by Todd Pinder. Pinder plies his trade in Honolulu, where he painstakingly crafts each and every board by hand. This doesn’t just apply to shaping, however — Pinder is one of those rare shapers who also glasses all of his own creations, too.
Todd Pinder creates all his boards by hand, shaping and glassing his creations. Here are a few boards waiting to be finished. Love the bold but simple red color.
Pinder might be a modern surfboard builder, but he draws upon some very deep roots from years of living in Hawaii and working alongside some well respected folks, like Carl Schaper (pronounced Shopper) and Donald Takayama. Pinder also continues to provide boards for folks like Joel Tudor and his sons.
Pinder’s shop is filled with a bunch of rad vintage sticks. See below for a neat Seventies Greg Liddle single fin. I can’t recall off the top of my head whether it was a hull, but I really dig the unusual pattern on the deck. Click the photos below to enlarge.
I got to see the Bing David Nuuhiwa Noseriding model that Joel Tudor posted about below. Todd told me the Nuuhiwa is a little shorter than other stock DN Noseriding models from the same time period.
The single coolest board Pinder showed me was an insane Joe Quigg paddleboard. Make sure you click the photos below to enlarge, as they show off the paddleboard in a bit more detail. Check out the squared off tail. The Joe Quigg paddleboard has incredibly thick rails, and I think it’s about 12′ long, so there’s plenty of paddle power to spare. You can see Pinder posing alongside this board in the post at the top of the page.
Here are some earlier photos, via Pinder’s Facebook page, that show Joe Quigg alongside Todd and the paddleboard.
That’s not all Pinder had stashed away, however. Upstairs in his shaping room Pinder also had a Seventies Surf Line Hawaii single fin shaped by Buddy Dumphy and a Gordon & Smith Skip Frye from the late Sixties. Click the photos below to enlarge. I couldn’t quite figure out which model the G&S / Skip Frye board is — maybe a “Speed Board”? — but it’s interesting that it has a small text G&S logo, instead of the classic bow tie logo that we all know and love. Pinder tells me the outline on the G&S / Skip Frye board has inspired some of his own egg shapes.
If you’re still not satisfied, well, there’s more. Pinder also showed off a sick Morey-Pope Sopwith Camel. The Sopwith Camel is one of Tom Morey’s many quirky and incredible Transition Era shapes, featuring an early stringerless design. I could go on a rant about how Tom Morey might be the most underrated inventor in surfing history, but I’ll save that for another time.
Pinder with a very cool Morey-Pope Sopwith Camel.
And while Pinder’s shaping room is filled with vintage gems, I’m even more stoked about his current creations. I mentioned it earlier, but it’s worth repeating: Pinder shapes and glasses all of his boards. Yes, all of them. Surfboards are often marketed as bespoke goods, but the manufacturing reality can be the opposite. When you order a surfboard from Pinder, you know it was built by one set of very capable hands from start to finish. If you even have the slightest appreciation for craftsmanship, that should resonate with you. As a bonus, Todd is a very friendly and surf stoked individual.
If you’re in the market for a beautiful new board, hit up Surfboards by Todd Pinder and tell him we sent you! You can also follow him on Instagram here and on Facebook here. Thanks Todd for inviting me to your studio and for sharing the story behind some killer surfboards!
Greetings, Shredderz! Sorry for all the radio silence here at Shred Sledz HQ, but I’m afraid our editorial staff was waylaid by a particularly nasty bug. But I digress. Today’s update features a rare board from a classic combination: a Donald Takayama Joel Tudor Pintail Pig currently up for sale on eBay. You can find a link to the board here. Pics via the eBay listing.
Tudor, of course, remains the world’s most famous longboarder a good two decades plus after he burst onto the scene as a wunderkind. Before his passing in 2012, Takayama had cemented his legacy as one of the finest shapers in the world. Takayama briefly disappeared from surfing during the 1980s to do time in federal prison as the result of a cocaine trafficking bust. In the nineties, Takayama revived his career and struck up a partnership with a young Joel Tudor. Their collaboration ended in 1998 — when Tudor was only 22 — as Tudor set up his own surfboard brand, working with shapers like Bill Shrosbree and Stu Kenson.
The board above is interesting for many reasons. First, Donald Takayama Joel Tudor models are generally difficult to find. I see a lot of older Takayama boards for sale on Craigslist, particularly around San Diego, where Takayama was based for much of his career (despite having been born in Hawaii), but it is more difficult to find ones with Tudor’s logo. In addition, the board above has two more interesting characteristics. First is the unusual “60’s Longboard Classic’s” (sic) laminate, which is hard to find. The other is the fact this is a “Pintail Pig”, a variant I have personally never seen before.
Here’s an example of a different board boasting the “60’s Longboard Classic’s” lam, but you’ll notice two differences: one, it doesn’t have Tudor’s name on it; two, the logo only reads “Pig.” The second aspect is a little strange, given that it sure looks like a pintail to me. The board is currently for sale on TheBoardSource.com. Pics taken via The Board Source listing (link here).
The Board Source has pictures of another Donald Takayama Joel Tudor board with the “60’s Longboard Classic’s” logo. This one, however, is not a pig design. Note that the wide point is much further up when compared with the Pig board above, and the tail is a squashtail. Note that the board is no longer for sale. You can find the original link to the board here.
Note the similarity between this board and the one at the top of the page. It has the “60’s Longboard Classic’s” logo and Tudor’s name, but it’s obviously not a Pintail Pig model. Pic via The Board Source
Back to the board at the top of the page: it’s for sale on eBay, it’s currently listed at $800, and from what I can tell, it’s a pretty rare example of a Donald Takayama Joel Tudor collaboration. What’s the catch? Well, the board is located in France, so unless you’re a Hossegor local with an eye for collectible boards, you’re going to have to add a couple of hundred bucks to the final cost. That said, it is a cool example of one of surfing’s most classic partnerships, and that’s always worth noting. Check out the board here.
Donald Takayama is a Shred Sledz favorite. Before his passing in 2012, Takayama struck up a memorable partnership with Joel Tudor. Takayama’s brand, Hawaiian Pro Designs, continues to produce boards from Takayama’s pioneering designs, but there’s no replacement for a board shaped by the man himself. Pictured below is a vintage Donald Takayama single fin.
The board is currently for sale Craigslist in San Diego. You can find a link to the board’s listing here. The seller is asking $499 for the board, and while that sounds steep, I think it might actually be justified.
The board pictured above has actually been written up before. Check out the Takayama post on The Surfboard Project (link here) that has some pictures of the same exact board from the last time it was sold. Even better, The Surfboard Project was able to get Tudor to chime in with some great context.
According to Tudor, the Donald Takayama single fin pictured above was shaped in either 1969 or 1970. During 1968 Takayama was still shaping boards under the Surfboards Hawaii label. You’ll note the board above doesn’t have any logos for Hawaiian Pro Designs, which was Takayama’s second brand. Tudor goes on to give some great back story about how Takayama’s first label went out of business after being blackballed from receiving blanks from Clark Foam! Anyway, I urge you to check out the link on The Surfboard Project.
The board above doesn’t seem to have a signature or any serial numbers written on the stringer, both of which are very common on later-era Takayama boards. It’s begging to be fixed up a bit and restored to some of its former glory. Maybe I’m crazy, but $500 doesn’t sound that nuts for such a unique board.
You can check out the Craigslist posting for the board here.
I’ve been writing about Morey Pope a bit lately, and here’s an incredible find from Buggs, who has one of the dopest surfboard collections known to mankind, and runs SurfboardLine in his free time. This is a balsa Morey Pope board from what looks to be 1966 — see the comments for some more knowledgeable people chiming in with info on this beaut.
Joel Tudor has been posting a lot of quality vintage content on his Instagram lately. This is a picture of Renny Yater. I’d guess late 1950s or early 1960s, but don’t quote me on that. Either way, it is one classic picture of one classic dude (and posted by another!)
Luis Real is the owner of North Shore Surf Shop on Oahu. He is also the owner an extensive collection of vintage surfboards that has been known to bring grown men to tears. He posts a lot of incredible stuff on Instagram and on the Vintage Surfboard Collectors group on Facebook. This post above is a rad picture of a rare Dick Brewer logo that features Sam Hawk and Owl Chapman as well. Note that in the top portion of the pic, Sam Hawk is on the left, Owl Chapman is in the middle, and Brewer himself is to the right.
Today’s post features some tasty Bonzer content for all you alternative surf craft fans. Check out this Shane Bonzer shaped by none other than Simon Anderson! This is a cool look at one of Anderson’s earlier experiments with a tri-fun setup before he invented the proper thruster and revolutionized surfboard designs forever. Note that the owner of the account above is none other than Duncan Campbell, brother of Malcolm and one of the co-founders of Campbell Bros.
Your last Bonzer related post of the day comes from none other than Joel Tudor. Check out the comments in the thread where Tudor and Malcolm Campbell are discussing how Joel is going to take that thing down from the rafters and have the outlined copied so he can make a repro. Check out the fin placement on the board on the right — just like the Campbell Bros recommend. Love the little “Bonzer Vehicles” logos you can see next to the side bites, not to mention the funky double concave and the super thinned out tails.
Look at this beautiful example of a Steve Lis fish! And check out those dimensions: at 5’2″ x 20 3/4″ x 2 1/2″ it’s not hard to see the kneeboarding influence. You can barely see a little logo on the bottom of the board towards the top.
Surfboards and Coffee (looks like their website isn’t quite ready for primetime yet) is a group of surfboard collectors in LA that host regular meetups to compare boards and ingest some caffeine. If I lived in that lovely City of Angels I’d like to think I’d be a regular, but alas Shred Sledz HQ isn’t moving from the Bay Area any time soon. Anyway, check them out on Instagram (and how about the spray job on that Stussy!)
Last but not least, Marc Andreini took to Facebook to explain some of the backstory behind his famous Vaquero design. The board on the right is an early predecessor of the Vaquero — then called the “365”, because Andreini and co found they could surf the board nearly every day of the year — from 1974.
I’ve written about Christian Fletcher before, and I will never, ever get sick of his old logo, which manages to be both an act of visual rebellion as well as a time capsule for the day glo SoCal surf scene of the 1980s and 1990s. This is an interesting example of a Fletcher board, as apparently it was shaped by pioneering Aussie shaper Nev Hyman, who founded what would later become Firewire Surfboards. The other Fletcher boards I’ve seen have been signed by California shapers like Randy Sleigh and Chris McElroy. This board was posted to the excellent Vintage Surfboard Collectors group on Facebook; click through the link for the rest.
Finally, here’s a bonus shot of Fletcher — pre-tattoos! — and a McElroy shape.
Ryan Lovelace is a talented shaper based in Santa Barbara. He posted this picture below recently, which shows an early George Greenough sailboard with an edge board design. Edge boards have come into vogue lately, thanks to shapers like Marc Andreini (Andreini), Manny Caro (Mandala), and Scott Anderson (Anderson).
Speaking of neon boards from the 80s and 90s, I’ll never, ever get sick of old Channel Islands boards. This guy on Instagram posts a bunch of sweet boards, and he has a collection of vintage Merricks that makes me sick with envy. Check out his feed for more.
We sure do love our Harbour Surfboards here at Shred Sledz. This here is an original Spherical Revolver model, measuring in at 7’3″. It has a nice original red Waveset fin, as you can see in the third picture. The board is listed at $600. Not sure whether or not this is all original, but click through to the listing if you’re curious.
Bill Shrosbree is a well-known San Diego shaper. He is the head shaper for Joel Tudor Surfboards. Shrosbree also shapes boards under the Fresh Pineapples label, which is definitely on the shortlist for coolest surfboard brand name. Pictured here is an early board, shaped under the “Shros” brand, complete with a cool little old school Moonlight Glassing logo. The board pictured here is a 6’6″ fish with glassed on fins. It has been misidentified in the ad as a Moonlight board. There are some dings and this isn’t the greatest photography I’ve ever seen on Craigslist, and the board is listed at $250. See link above.
Apologies for the not so great picture, but it looks like a vintage Liddle, and it’s being listed at $90! Like the Shrosbree board above, the Craigslist poster has not correctly identified the board in the ad. It looks pretty weathered, and I suspect there are some bad repairs lurking under those mysterious bad patches on the right rail and the nose, but like I said, it’s a Liddle and it’s $90. 7′ single fin, too.
Here’s a quick hit for you: a rare Joel Tudor logo for a Donald Takayama board.
The board is listed on eBay, which you can find here. It’s not in great shape, including two delam spots and a decent amount of sun damage. I have never seen this logo before, though, and it’s a great example of a more obscure aspect of one of the greatest surfer / shaper partnerships in modern surfing.
What we’ve got here is a reasonably priced little two-fer in the San Francisco Bay Area (in Mill Valley, just north of the city). This is a gem of a little Craigslist post with two very tempting surfboards up for sale. Surfboard #1 – the pink board pictured – is a 7′8″ round tail egg from Joel Tudor Surfboards. Unclear who the shaper is from the pics. Bill Shrosbee and Stu Kenson are some reasonable guesses, as the owner of the board dates this to the early 2000s, in the early days of the Joel Tudor Surfboards label. Oh, and before we get too carried way going down the endless rabbit hole of surfboard trivia, this board is a steal at $350.
Second is a Rich Pavel fish. Pavel shapes under the Greenroom Surfboards label, and you can see the logo clearly in the last pic. The Craigslist ad says it’s a Speed Dialer; however, Pavel’s website suggests the quad fin version of the famous Speed Dialer is actually called the Creekfish. The board is 5′10″ and the owner claims it was surfed less than five times. $550 is a reasonable price, if not quite the ridiculous bargain of the $350 for the Tudor egg. As a point of comparison, there’s another Rich Pavel quad fin fish on Craigslist now for $375, and that’s with some pretty serious looking ding repair on the tail.
As the Craigslist add suggests, both of these boards would be worthy additions to any self-respecting surfer’s summer quiver, and they’re available at good prices, too.
