To celebrate the collaboration of Polar Skate Co. and Jack Purcell latest collaboration the whole Polar crew plus their own obstacles went to The City of Angels. When good people do good things.
Featuring: Jonas Skröder, Dane Brady, Pontus Alv, Paul Grund, Roman Gonzalez, David Stenstrom and Jerome Campbell.
Photo by Nils Svensson.
Summer is in full effect and thus it is only logical that Paul Herrmann started putting out his column consistently.
Whereas his last video was filmed all over Germany this one takes place in Berlin. Similarly the last one had many people from different crews this one focusses on one crew consisting of a gang of all-star wearing youngsters.
For those of you that follow him, it must come as no surprise that Deniz Bulgurcu has a strong presence in this video. His growth is visible in almost every new clip he puts out. Deniz is one to watch.
Additionally, Paul Herrmann would like to thank Converse for the support.
James Cruickshank is definitely one of the most talented filmmakers in our skateboarding community. This piece was filmed just a few weeks ago and features a small selected part from the European Converse Cons team and introduces a household name: Mauro Caruso.
A video by James Cruickshank for a brief glance skateboardmag, in association with Converse Cons.
Filmed on location in the region of Puglia, Italy and starring: Felipe Bartolomé, Remy Taveira, Pietro Bontà, Ollie Lock, Jonas Hess, Jerome Campbell and Mauro Caruso.
Film and edit by James Cruickshank.
The times of big budget productions are over. Now everyone and your uncle got the chance to hit the 1.000.000 views. We really like that and we also have the feeling, that some of the pressure is gone this way. Power to the inaccurate! Get your camera out, Streetlab Stockholm did the same thing!
Featuring: Simon Källkvist, Samuel Norgren, Elias Mensi, Tom Botwid and Victor Larsson Blè.
Felipe Bartolome is actually one of our favorites. He’s one of those people you have to meet in real life to see and feel his power and the way he deals with things. Although he won’t be up before noon, there is a huge amount of energy parked somewhere in his body, that pours out just right after he wakes. His batteries are charged around noon, I guess.
When we met Felipe again in January for a Converse event in Stockholm, Sweden he told us to come to Madrid and stay for a while to go out skating with his friends. While he was probably just being nice to us, we had actually thought about it earlier but kept our mouths shut because we thought packing our things to visit Spain for the 50th time might be a bit much. Besides, we didn’t wanna make a false promise, of course. Though Felipe admitted he was a bit astonished when he got the call that we will be on the plane within the next few days, he surely responded positively to the news.
Johannes Schirrmeister is not a well-known skater, but he belongs to a group of young Berliners that are on a very good way to become more noted in the future. Next to the feature in our new issue, with photos shot on one day by our staff member Steffen Grap, we have a documentary made by Nils Hansen, featuring Johannes’ day in Jerusalem.
Skateboarding is about many things, mostly it is about the skateboarder and his skateboard interacting together. This interaction begins with you learning to stand on the board, pushing, ollieing, shoving the board, nollie, fakie, switch or normal stance. Some learn faster, some slower, but the objective is the same; “Stay on the board.” This article is not about that, this is about getting off the board (and getting back on afterwards), walking or running with or without, maybe even away from the board.
Today we offer you a step by step analysis (lmao) of some of the most influential skaters who got off the board.
A Different Route.
Right off the bat, we start with two of the most classic walks caught on tape! At the same time, both Jason Dill and Louie Barletta use walking to get somewhere or to walk over something they could not get to by staying on the board. Louie’s might be a little more eccentric because not many people skate terraces like he did, but still, both these guys made a lot of people get off the board.
John Motta uses the same principle but instead of picking his board up and taking it with him, he chooses to leave it and jump on the next one. A technique, mostly used by filmers, while filming long lines, with a lot of ups and downs like stairs. Normally I’d go for the pickup but doing it John’s way creates a little more suspense about what is about to come next.
Cruising To The Spot.
I am not totally sure if Mike V just got back from an injury here or if he just has that much pent up punk rock Aggression, but Mr. Vallely does deserve his props for this ‘powerful cruise through the city’ style line! He manages to push skateboarding by keeping it true to his style of skating, whilst at the same time doing tricks that every skater would like to do, while going from one to another spot.
Vincent, on the other hand, seems like he just came from the corner store where he bought a soda, and on his way back, he noticed he could flip his board in there. Probably the most relaxed walk of the bunch, which contrasts quite nicely with Mr. V’s spurt.
The Bail To Pick up a.k.a. The Never Give Up.
This is a more recent phenomenon, ever since iPhone filming became an everyday thing, skaters started to worry less about wasting tape and thus happy accidents made it into our collective memory. The reason why we like this style of walking is because it makes everything seem so much more spontaneous, it reminds us of skating around with the homies, instead of the sometimes tedious process of perfecting things in front of the lens.
The Hop Off, Hop On.
The Hop off and Hop On is a method perfected by one of today’s most influential skaters: Mr. Kevin Rodrigues. He has a knack for wall riding, no comply flipping or throwing down his board (to hippy jump) and moving into the next trick. The great thing about this combination is that everybody can join in, just remember: the most important thing is the rhythm of your walk! Hesitation can sneak in and ruin an otherwise great line.
The Mid Trick Walk Along.
To be honest, a lot of these moves seem to come straight from a Louie Barletta, who should be on everybody’s favorite skater list by now. Go watch his parts and you will notice that the only difference is that these tricks are done in a serious manner, instead of with a weird hat and a Rod Stewart track. Anyway, you have to find the right trick and spot (a long slide) to do this but if you do the possibilities are endless.
Walk The Line.
This one doesn’t really need any explaining, does it?
Walking as a mode of skating.
A fancy way to say that walking can be the actual main dish instead of a side order that only add’s to the meal. Case and point CK1’s stroll on these metal arm rests, imagine him replacing that walk with a series of hippy jumps, it wouldn’t be the same right?
The Stop Walk And Roll.
This is the only section that doesn’t involve the board moving before hand, it is the simple idea of placing your board somewhere (very high in this case) and jumping on it. Most skaters use this to test out spots but very few use it as a means to an end, which it can be in the right hands. In our opinion, this is the little brother of the caveman nosegrind that Andrew Allen popularized a while back. We say little because everybody can try this one at almost every spot.
The Walk Home.
For the older skaters amongst us, this is a pretty common thing. You need to wrap up the session because your significant other wants to home and the baby needs to be fed, time to go, leave the board and take a walk home.
Everyone’s new favorite skater Sage Elsesser with some sort of you may call “B-Sides” video for Quartersnacks. We do not care if its A-B- or C Footage – we’ll take it anyway.
Babylon LA and Converse got together for a collaboration, and to show what they came up with here is a video from the city of angels. Not your average skate video from the world’s capital of traffic lights and security guards.
Picture the following scenery: It’s August the 15th, we are in Abu Dhabi and the clock is about to hit the 12 pm mark. Can you imagine how it would feel to skate outside in the heat of the desert city? Well, the day before yesterday we did the complete opposite of the above-explained situation. Converse CONS sent us out to Stockholm/Sweden (Yeah, it was cold), where we celebrated a very special happening. Main topic was: David Stentström took us on a very personal tour through his life in Stockholm (HERE you have the masterpiece) and some of us took a little but happy detour that night. The following photos will give you a taste of who was there:
In addition to our latest “At Home With” issue, we produced a few videos to go along with the articles. We will release these videos on our website the next couple of days, starting today. Watch “Berlin Bound”, a video by Steffen Grap & Peter Buikema, below!
Whenever we got to see Jonas footage we all get a permanent smile on our faces that is lasting for quite a while. The fact that the edit is coming out of Leon Rudolph’s hands turns our smile to an even brighter level. Is this love?. Here’s Jonas Hess’s new video:
A good amount of the American CONS Team went on a trip to Australia & New Zeland to give some demos and hang out with the locals, starring: Sage Elsesser, Sean Pablo, Mike Anderson, Kenny Anderson, Bobby De Keyzer, Aaron Herrington, Al Davis, Brian Delatorre, Zered Bassett, Jake Johnson, Andrew Brophy, Bryce Golder, and Dean Palmer.
In about three weeks I’m going on vacation to Lanzarote. Just in time, there is a short about Octavio Barrera traveling from Barcelona to the island of Lanzarote/Canary Islands. If this would not have come out before I went I am sure I would not take my skateboard with me. Now, I might give it a try. A short film by Dani Millan for RVCA featuring Octavio & Carlos Cardenosa.
In the last week of July we decided to make a trip to Montreal, Canada. Our good friends Friedjof Feye and Jonathan Peters have been out there for already three weeks when we got to the city on the east coast. I have pictured it way different, maybe because I always had a very romantic image in my head, when i thought about Northern American cities. But actually, in the end, we always ended up in the industrial part of the city. And those areas always have had the most romantic look to it and so does the industrial architecture in Canada. Especially on a Sunday. When no one is around and it seems like a ghost town. On the other side, the Downtown part of the city is comparable with any other major city in Canada, the USA or even Australia. Allthough, it is more peaceful! But we already decided to have a look around the outskirts of Canada’s second biggest town. With a group of around five guys we were wandering the empty streets and I think each one of us was documenting in a quite different way. Fidi was using a Olympus Mju 1 and his Fuji 200 – Here’s a few snap shots:
We are delighted to announce that we have switched over to a new video player. Starting today we are using the VICE video player to feature some of our classic and all of our up and coming video projects. Posted bellow are the pick of the litter from our video archive, so you can revisit some of the best audio-visual we produced together with our partners.
PLACE Project Russia – “Beautiful Chaos”
Tolia Titaev For PLACE
PLACE Call It A Day – Nike SB Special Feature
A Bankers Diary.
TPDG Street Jazz.
Last week PLACE issue 56 landed in the mail and when an issue is done it is time to host a little get together. Of course the event had be in Paris and while we where out there working on the issue we had found the perfect place. So when the time came we linked up with the people from Chez Justine to set the right atmosphere, it all turned out well and it was a great evening.
Special thanks to Converse and FUTUR for supporting the event.
Photography by Danny Sommerfeld
Any conversation about Russia and its youth culture these days is bound to include Gosha Rubchinskiy. It’s inevitable. He’s considered one of the most exciting streetwear designers of the day – with collections in haute stores such as Dover Street Market and Tres Bien – as well as an influential photographer. His work is without a doubt a reason why the fashion world is looking East for fresh ideas. His approach consists of an authentic mix of real life situations unfolding around him, captured in a Soviet aesthetic and told in a Russian accent. Skateboarding always plays a major part in Gosha’s imagery and its focus on showing teenagers on the streets in their natural environment. Most of the teenagers don’t even know about their power and their style, which is what inspires Gosha and makes the results appear so real. It’s just normal life, caught with an open mind.
We’ve had the pleasure to meet Gosha in his own Moscow neighborhood, in between bar hopping and walking around from one club to another. To no surprise, he turned out to be a friendly guy who likes to share his story. And it was also impressive to find out that he is taking care of his friends a lot and that he has such a strong belief in a romantic idea of community.
Interview by Benni Markstein
How did you get started with photography? What is your background?
Initially, I started photography in my school years just for fun. I just shot my friends with basic film cameras. It was nothing special. During college, I took some photography lessons and learned how to use mirror film cameras. I studied fashion, styling, hair dressing and some make-up. I always had a need to document my work, so I had to learn more about photography because I had to present it. I learned that it is always better to have a complete project. When I started my fashion project, I started to use my photography for it, since I knew how to develop film. But anyway, I was already taking pictures of my friends my entire life, for example while going out or skating.
Your new book Youth Hotel just launched. Please tell us something about making that book.
There is a hotel in Moscow from the ‘80s that was built for the Olympic Games for the youth and young sportsmen. It’s a strange building with 28 floors in a real Soviet mood and feel. One day a friend of mine, who is a stylist, came to Moscow and she wanted to stay in a strange hotel. So we chose this one as I also wanted to take a look inside and see what’s going on there. It was very interesting, so we rented a room, spent some time there, invited some friends and had some parties there. It’s very empty, so we had the entire floor for us, played some music, danced and also we could smoke. During these parties I shot some pictures there. My friends of IDEA Books, who also made my last book Crimea / Kids, asked me to do something new and asked if I had something for them. I said yes and told them that I have some great outtakes from my Youth Hotel series that we could use. I mixed these pictures with last year’s cool pictures that I never used. I think the name Youth Hotel is very romantic. Youth is such a short period of time in your life that you spend shortly.
You mentioned that you had unused photographs you were able to use. Do you feel that different outlets are also important to realize different ideas in your work?
Photography for me is like a diary. It’s about documenting. I see something and when I think it’s interesting I shoot some faces or some outfits or some boys wearing something in a good way. Afterwards, I can use it for inspiration in my new collections. It’s always interesting to document some energy, or some moods, and to look back for some inspiration.
Please describe the overall image and aesthetic you are aiming to create.
I see something interesting here in Moscow, in Russia. My friends are doing interesting things that I always wanted to show to other Russian people, and also internationally. It doesn’t matter if it’s through photography, or films, or fashion – those are just different ways to show it. For me, it is always about showing things that are happening in Moscow and what is interesting and what is our mood.
The Moscow mood?
Moscow, or Russian, or my Gosha mood – I don’t know! It’s all about the same things told through different outlets. But what is it? I don’t know, it’s my vision; it’s different things that I think are great. If I think this guy is great, or this building, or this landscape is great, I want to show it to people.
And if people don’t like it?
Anyway, I like reactions. It’s a good thing when people react because it’s bad when people don’t care about you. I like bad reactions like: “What the hell is he doing?!” I like that.
What’s your background in skateboarding? Do you still skate?
I’m not, like, a big skater. I started when I was 22 years old. During my school years I never had friends that skated and I was really focused on art, sitting at home and drawing. Later I met some people that skated, not too crazy just in a basic way. Sometimes I go skating but I’m very busy right now and you only have a few months during the year to skate in Moscow. I’m not professional enough to go to indoor skate parks in the wintertime. Also, every year it’s a challenge to kind of start skating again and again. It’s always like stepping on your board for the first time. Anyway, I try to remember how it works.
For me it’s a about the romantic of being a teenager having time to go skate in the streets to escape problems.
Some people still live this life, people who used to do it since they were teenagers. I like to go skate on sunny days in summer and to watch others doing good tricks, to cruise around and take some pictures.
I guess you have many friends that skate, then?
Yeah yeah, it’s a big community with friends, and their friends! When I met these guys for the first time around eight years ago, I thought wow, this is really cool and it is something so true and strong. These guys are really interesting people, the most interesting guys in Russia are from the skate community. Because it mixes guys from different areas: some football fans, some musicians, some Hip Hop dancers, and graffiti guys – they all skate together. Skateboarding is the connection. If you want to meet cool dudes it’s easy to find them in the skate community. For me, it was like fresh air when I met skateboarders for the first time and every year new and cool people become part of the community.
Do you see similarities between skating and fashion? And do you get inspired from skating?
Yes, of course. Normal life always inspires me. I can be inspired by some cool 15 year old guy coming to the spot for the first time because he has some weird style and I will use it for my collection. It works this way for me; one guy can inspire the whole collection. I met Kevin Rodrigues in Paris who has a very cool style – he is really inspiring. Everybody around him is now wearing the same style as him and this is how it works.
How did that connection with Kevin happen and is he your new muse?
First of all, I’m checking what’s going on in the skate world and of course I saw him many times in videos and I liked his style. The first time I met him was in London through a Converse presentation. And when I saw him in real life I thought he was an interesting guy, and that I would like to know him more. Six month later we met again in Paris at Place de la République because we have some friends in common. So we started hanging out, drinking beer, and he was like “Oh, you’re from Russia! That’s cool, we love Russian people.” So we became friends from the first day. It’ the same with Ben Kadow from the US, how they look and how they skate is something I really like.
What do you think is are the differences between the Moscow scene compared to other cities?
I think the main difference is the places to skate because of the weather and the winter. In Moscow, people have to do all the things they like to do during the summer period because in the wintertime everybody starts to become lazy. I think that’s the main difference between Russia and other countries. But besides that, I think in terms of the community, friendships, and skateboarding – everywhere is the same around the world. That’s because it’s so easy if you go to Paris, or to China, and meet some people at the spot, it’s the same connection.
Many people pay attention to my work and that’s why I need to use it to show the good things about Russia.
At one time you said that you would like to change people’s perception of Russia through your work. Is that true?
Yeah, it’s one of my ideas that I want to show Russia the way I see it. I think I have my own vision and I want to show it because it’s hard to imagine how it is if you don’t live here. I have power and the ways to show it – so that’s why I need to use it. Many people pay attention to my work and that’s why I need to use it to show the good things about Russia. Now we’re living in a time of information war, and especially many bad things about Russia and I would like to say: No, it’s not really like that. I can show you what’s happening. Well, and what I think is the beauty of being a Russian.
Why is there some much attention on Russia at the moment? What is attracting the people?
It was a closed country for many years and no one knew what was secretly happening inside. It was just a big myth surrounding what it is – and it still is. The country is big and of course you can be in Moscow or St. Petersburg, which is easy. But that is not the real Russia. You have to go to other cities to understand the Russian mentality better. Like you told me the story of this security guard Dima in Sochi and what his soul is like. I think you’ll understand more now. These are things I also like to show about Russia, because I think it’s good here. It’s not only clichés.
So what do you have coming up for the future and new projects?
I have an idea for a short movie so I try to find free time for it. First of all, I need to sit down, write the script and then start filming. This will be my next project.
So, will there be skateboarders involved?
Of course, ha-ha!
All photos by Gosha Rubchinskiy
When I met Sage, he told me that he often feels like the guy interviewing him becomes his friend, so he’ll talk to them about everything. Sometimes that will get him into trouble, at the same time I feel like a person who is confident enough to be himself at all times is a breath of fresh air. That doesn’t mean that some things can’t be private, but being open might make all the difference when it comes to a person’s longevity in the skateboard business. Because what interviewer likes to hear the same answers over and over again? I certainly don’t. Sage is a natural who isn’t afraid to have his friends’ back and speak up about people or things he doesn’t like. Here’s the 18 year old FA team rider from New York in his own words.
You’re on a European tour with the CONS team right now. Any interesting stories so far?
Nothing much, dudes just ripping. Motherfuckers are all good as fuck, there are not many stories though, we drove around from skatepark to skatepark, from spot to spot. I do feel like on a Europe trip it’s a lot harder to eat, I just forget to eat. In Paris for instance I just ended up eating three baguettes a day at the most, in the US it’s a lot easier because you know where to go to get some food.
Last year the Illegal Civilization crew came out with their second video, a lot of people were shocked by what they saw. Can we expect something new from IC this year?
My friend Mikey Alfred makes all the IC videos and clothes but right now he’s working with Tyler The Creator a lot so I don’t really know what’s going on. But the IC2 video was sick, it was one long big inside joke. The video is just about us hanging out and skating together, we’re a group of friends going out cruising.
A lot of people were hating on the video because they felt the video contained things like animal cruelty but I personally don’t feel like that, the video is sick! I didn’t like my footage, though. Most of my clips where too old and the tricks were weak, but Na-kel, Kevin, and Tyshawn really came through with sick parts.
FS Nosegrind
Is there a difference for you between a Converse Project or a Supreme type thing?
With Supreme, making a clip is super natural, we all grew up skating together and we still skate together almost everyday, it’s just the boys: we go skate, some days we might not go skate, some days are terrible and we argue, some days are great, but it’s always a lot of laughter because we are amongst friends. For me Kevin [Bradley] is just an inspirational guy. He’ll smoke ten blunts and all of a sudden he’ll start skating, Bang! He’ll land a sick trick, that makes me want to step it up a notch, too. I think there is a Supreme thing coming soon, though.
Do you feel like you do your best skating when you are amongst friends?
It depends… sometimes when I’m on a tour like this, I want to step it up a notch.
I noticed a couple of people hating on Sean [Pablo] does that happen a lot?
Yeah! I hate when people talk shit on Sean. Somebody started to try and one-up one of his tricks so when Sean landed it first, I went out on the course to show Sean some love. People are just mad because he’s 17 years old getting flown all over the world, he’s got a great style, and he’s pretty. I look at it this way, though – if people are not hating on you, you’re doing something wrong. Dylan [Rieder] is one of the best skateboarders in the world, sometimes I call him super Dylan. Sean gets a lot of the same hate Dylan gets, it’s not their fault that they are fucking gorgeous. They skate like ballerinas, it’s just natural for them, it just looks to good for some people so they start to hate on them. But Sean’s my friend, so I’ll always have his back. That’s why Fucking Awesome is the best. You can just do you, paint your nails, make your own clothes, start a ‘zine, all that stuff.
Do you get to do some of your own FA stuff?
No, Dill does all the graphics himself. Dill is like Cinderella’s step mom. He wants you to be on point, I might meet up with him and he’ll say: “That shirt sucks, take that off.” That’ll leave me feeling embarrassed at times.
I don’t think he would say that about the shirt you’re wearing now (Sage is wearing a Malcolm X T-shirt).
Hell no! This is something everybody can fuck with because it says something important: “I will join anyone, I don’t care what color you are, as long as you want to change the miserable condition that exists on this Earth.” Dill taught us a lot, though. We all came up pretty fast but at the same time it feels really natural. Dill is strict but he isn’t mean for no reason and it’s working. FA is our shit! It’s crazy when I travel to places and I see the influence we have on kids. It’s still kind of weird. Supreme did that poster of Kevin in Thrasher. (BS Tailslide as seen in the Supreme SF clip). Now kids all over the world are hanging that poster on their wall. To me, that’s so sick!
by Roland Hoogwater
Photos: Jon Coulthard
Kenny Anderson has been pro for a long time and his journey has been well documented. A little while ago we heard about Kenny’s car, a Mercedes that runs on alternative fuel. We met up with Kenny to find out more about his modified vehicle.
Kenny, you drive a car, that runs on vegetable oil, which is very cool. Not many skateboarders seem to care about the environment – how did you get into it?
I always liked cars so when a friend of mine started a business restoring cars, I bought one from him. This was about ten years ago, I bought an old diesel and I had already read a lot about modifying cars so you could run them on vegetable oil. I definitely have some political and environmental reasons to drive a modified car, but it’s more about having options. For me it’s comparable to skateboarding or art, you want to experiment and experience new things. For me personally, modifying my car was a big project to take on, similar to an art project so when it worked out I was pretty stoked…
So you had to modify your car?
Yes, a little bit but not too much, it’s not a big investment, especially when you think of all the money I save because of the modifications.
I saw a clip, in which you were going to the back of a restaurant to pick up the vegetable oil – how did this connection come about?
I called around and asked about ten different restaurants in the end only one said yes. The other nine looked at me like I was completely nuts or they would say:“ I’ll call you back “, but they never did… in the end there was one restaurant that was down to let me use their used oil, I think it was because the guy already heard about cars running on used vegetable oil, and they already had another guy, that picked up used oil for his car. I was lucky to find a place that would allow me to have their oil because driving a car on this kind of fuel is not too common in the area where I live in Los Angeles…
What do you have to do with the oil? Do you filter it?
Yeah, when I go to pick up the oil the restaurant has already filtered the oil once, then I transport the oil back home and filter it two more times… I know it sounds like a lot of work, but I have this machine that does the work for me, so it’s really quite simple…
How much do you have to pay for the oil?
Nothing, at all! But at the same time driving on vegetable oil is illegal in the states, which is something I find strange. Normally when you buy fuel, the road tax is included in the fuel price but since I use an alternative fuel I don’t contribute to this system. Which in turn means I don’t pay road tax, which is a crime. I don’t think it’s smart to say that in an interview though… (laughs). I know some other people that run their cars on veggie oil and some have a bumper sticker on their car that says: This vehicle runs on Vegetable oil. As a result of this some of them got pulled over by the cops and got a ticket. I haven’t received one yet though but I also don’t have a sticker on my car (laughs).
We as skateboarders use up a lot of trees and use epoxy glues which are not environmentally friendly, so is this a way to give back?
I think so, I’m not one to preach, but this is my way to do something! Sometimes kids come up to me and ask me to show them my car, and this is the way I like to promote vegetable oil as a fuel!
I like that you are using your status as a pro skater as a tool to promote something thats good for the environment!
As I said, I like it, but I’m going to preach or force people to choose my path. This is my way… For me personally it’s important to think outside the box and make decisions accordingly, especially when you have the chance to do so…
Did the modification of your car in anyway change your perspective on life in other aspects?
I guess so… The way you eat, growing your own food, things like that. Maybe using less… Biking more…
by Roland Hoogwater
Opener Photo: Brixton