Tag: skateboards

Poetic Collective is a brand that is trying to do things in their own way, the name of the company suggests that there is a group of people working on the project and that is the truth. The company has its roots in the art world with multiple artists or art students contributing to the collective look and feel. We had a talk with Tom Botwid about Poetic’s new collection, their team riders, the nostalgic vs. the contemporary, and drawing inspiration from outside of skating. We are happy to present their new collection together with Tom who provides some extra context to the whole thing. Enjoy!

This is your sixth collection isn’t it?
So much has changed from our first collection up until now I am sitting in my apartment right now and I have a board from each collection and the first one only had one t-shirt and one board and I did that while I was still studying art in Berlin. There I was making a lot of things that were very conceptual and I wanted to break away from that and make something that would speak to me aesthetically but didn’t necessarily have that strong conceptual background to it. So I talked to some people and they were interested so we made some boards without thinking too much about it. Just making something that you like to look at and skate on. Since then we progressed a lot, the first video I did the filming, my brother did the editing and we got a lot of good reactions. Now it is a proper company that is growing fast, maybe too fast when you have a normal job as well and then I feel like we progressed a lot aesthetically as well. We were trying to do something different and over time we dared to take bigger risks and that started growing us more and more into our own. The basic idea stayed the same, though we draw our inspiration from outside of skateboarding. I.E. when a new company comes along and has graphics inspired by an 80’s or 90’s company they are still referencing skateboarding and “skate art” but there are so many possible aesthetic influences that can be introduced into skateboarding. So to me, it was very limiting to only look inside skateboarding for inspiration. So much in skateboarding is wrapped up in nostalgia right now.

I noticed that Sarah Meurle has her own board can you tell me how that happened.
I think it is nice both to show the skills she has combined with her interests in photography but also to give her a platform that will draw attention to the fact that she is one of the best female skaters in Europe. She has been working hard and she has been sponsored for a long time already and done so much so we want to give her a platform and the good thing is skateboarding has been opening up to female skating as well.
I see Sarah’s board more as that she gets to do something with her photography than as a pro board, then we would want to get more guest artists in to do a series. We want to invite people in that fit in with our themes that at the same time allow us to reach over to other platforms and draw in different audiences. As for Sarah, it was important for us to let her do this on her own terms because a lot of female skateboarders only get portrayed by men and we wanted to have her express herself as she wants.

So do you select riders of their interests? Is that a factor?
Not of their interests but I do want them to have an understanding of what the company is about and I want them to be able to relate to that and be able to stand behind the ideas and product we produce. Because as a smaller company I can’t offer the riders that much so I feel it is important that they really want to be a part of it and are willing to invest themselves. Not everybody on the team has a big art interest but everybody has an understanding of what we are and are trying to do.

I know what you mean, sometimes I watch a VX1000 filmed skateboard video and my girlfriend says “Did they film this in the 90’s?” and the crazy thing is I don’t even notice the fact that the quality looks vintage for me the VX1000 is still up-to-date.
I thought about that but you do notice when something is very contemporary, like the clips Johnny Wilson is making, that instantly feels like today. That doesn’t mean that I don’t like VX footage, the nostalgia works but when I stop and think about it I want our stuff to looks contemporary.
But when you come to clothes and boards it is hard to do something that is not pre-set for us. Meaning that you have a body to work with and you have the shape of the skateboard reinventing those are big challenges.

That is why you need those other outputs like video, so you have more freedom still, we always try to keep an open mind when it comes to those two things. Then again references can be fun! We are doing the Muska thing in this collection which is ironic because he is moving away from skateboarding into the realm of art. At the same time, it’s fun because some will get it immediately and other will be like Muska who? First, we wanted to call that the noseslide stuff but this works better.

So for the Muska thing the colors were set but how do you guys choose the other colors that make up a collection?
In the beginning, we worked a lot with black and white, which are art references, we also had a red dot in reference to the selling of art but then Free skateboard mag came about and we decided to drop it. But as we progressed there was so much black and white being used in skateboarding that we felt like we wanted to work with colors more. A lot of the colors we use come from paintings and looking at things we want to use color tones that are not that in your face, we want to have it flow nicely together and combine that into something you would want to wear, even as a grown up.

Even as a grown up (laughs)!
To me, pink for instance has always been the opposite of what is black & white which are like “hardcore cool” and pink transforms things into something else and that is interesting. For a while, though I was doubting the pink on Sarah’s board because it seems almost cliché because she is a female but it actually worked well and she liked it. To me, the pink that we used doesn’t represent gender it represents something softer.

We are a group of people that hang out together and skate together but at the same time, we don’t want to push that part as a “cool” thing. It is not like ‘we are the shit, fuck everybody else’, it is more like a love thing and to me, pink represents that.

Alright! So since you are definitely into balancing things out well, how did you choose what type of clothes to make and what kind of fit to use?
I look at a lot of fashion outside of the skateboarding realm and as I said before that connects back to the point I made earlier that influence can come from different directions. At the same time, we still make a lot of basics as well. At the same time, I would like the company to grow so I can do some more obscure stuff as well. As for the fit, we spent a lot of time finding the right fit but it’s hard cause the next color way can have a different fit.

What about the boards?
As far as the boards go there is a lot to choose from! But the thing is people have their own preferences, they always say what about that shape what about this? I like them how we make them now and a lot of people do so why change that?

So what kind of people would you love to collaborate with?
Karin Mamma Andersson who is one of the biggest Swedish painters that is totally removed from skateboarding I wouldn’t necessarily want to do that Mark Gonzales guest board. I like something that is so far out that it becomes interesting.

Catalog photos by Nickolina Knapp
Lifestyle photos by Robin Pailler

Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, and the Bronx – these are the five boroughs that compose what is probably the most vibrant city in the world. In the mid-1990s, when the skateboard industry was still focused on the West Coast, Steve Rodriguez and Mark Nardelli got together and thought about running their own board company straight out of New York, their hometown. Since those days many things have changed, including spots, team riders and the whole way of riding a skateboard. But the passion and unique style of the company still continues to grow, driven by the artistic outlook on life maintained by Nardelli, who is running the business out of his apartment on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

For this story, We got the chance to take a look behind the scenes and find out why 5BORO is a one-of-a-kind company with amazing board graphics like the VHS series, and especially the very popular plane series drawn by our good friend Stefan Marx. Thanks to this connection, we found ourselves chatting it up with Nardelli in NYC one day, where we talked about the history, creative ideas, and that special something behind the Five Boroughs.

NYC

How did 5boro come to life?
5boro was started by Steve Rodriguez back in the ‘90s. It seemed like skateboarding on the East Coast was going through an explosion during those years. [Filmer] RB Umali came out with the first Eastern Standard Time videos, and around the same time Dan Wolfe released the Eastern Exposure videos. Those videos coming out gave the East Coast such a big amount of exposure, we felt there was a lot of momentum and we wanted to do our own thing. The scene was kind of comparable to how it is nowadays – with different crews having their own creative ideas and making their own products. The only thing is that the New York of the ‘90s is very different from today, in that the city is a lot friendlier right now.

How did you get involved with the company?
Me and Steve where both on some independent companies prior to 5boro and I always got involved with the companies I rode for. At first 5boro was run by Steve and another guy, but after a while Steve found out his partner was doing some crooked business through 5boro, so he fazed him out. And that’s where I came into the picture. So around 1996, I started working for 5boro, so that means I’m approaching the 20-year mark. I ran the company together with Steve for 15 years and for the last five I’ve been doing it by myself with help from Tombo, our team manager.

studio2 Kopie

Can you tell me a little bit about how skating in New York was back in the mid-90s?
This was just after the big pants, small wheels era that skating went through and skating seemed to come back around to what we would call solid street skating.
Pretty much, but there were still a lot of people skating around with small wheels, but at the same time you had people skating 8.5 inch boards with 60 mm wheels. People were still skating very technical, it was a progressive time in skating where we were finding out what the standards were.

5boro stands for the five boroughs that make up New York. Do you feel like it is important for the brand to have this connection to the city?
I doesn’t really matter to me, but we are a New York brand and some people around the country have given me the feedback that they could sell New York products. It does have its ups and downs, but for me it’s more important that we make good products and do good things for skateboarding. At the end of the day – love it or leave it.

nardelli-book Kopie

What is your favorite borough?
I feel like that changes from time to time. I am very attached to my neighborhood, Chinatown in Manhattan. I was going to Queens Astoria and I really liked the neighborhood so I popped into a real estate agency to see what an apartment would cost. At the same time, there are so many good spots out in the city even when you have been living here for 20-something years you’ll still come across place you haven‘t seen before.

Who is responsible for the visual direction of the brand?
In the beginning it would be friends of ours that handed us graphics, but I feel the aesthetic of all of those artists didn’t have a similar vibe. So now we work with artists who have an aesthetic that fits each other’s work. This in turn means that the visual identity has a clearer direction.
I might approach certain artists if their work connects to an idea I have, but in the end I am the one who curates and guides the process. Still though, I have to say I get a lot of help from family, friends, skateboarders, and artists.

mark-nardelli-studio

Where did you meet Stefan Marx?
Originally I met him when he was visiting NYC. He was around and I would see him here and there and I knew about his artwork, but we got hooked up through my friend Pitt, who works at Cleptomanicx. Eventually, Stefan asked if he could stay at my place for a month and I said yes, but in the back of my mind I was thinking, ‘Fuck, this dude is going to be with me for a month!’ So right when he arrived hurricane Sandy hit and we didn’t have any electricity so he ended up crashing on my sister’s couch for about two weeks and we were working in a friend’s art studio. In the end we had the illest time and from that experience we remained in contact and eventually made a series of 5boro x Stefan Marx boards.

5boro-vhs

I feel like 5boro boards are often bought with the purpose of hanging them on the wall. People seem interested in the art just as much as the boards themselves.
Yes, I feel like we have become the artist’s skateboard company, at least here in NYC. People often ask me when the next series is coming out, but we are definitely a company that values quality over quantity. There is a sick series which we did called the Modern Art series, we put that out a couple of years ago and the graphics were inspired by Stuart Davis; a popular artist in the 1950s. It’s my favorite series we ever did, but no one saw it.

mark-nardelli-vhs

Why not?
This was before Instagram and all these social media tools that can help expand your reach as a brand. So now when we do a series like the VHS series, a lot more people see the boards than before the social media explosion. Going back to the VHS series, though, that idea came because I had old VHS tapes that I saved because my parents wanted to throw them out. I didn’t want to lose my first sponsor-me tape, so I brought a couple of tapes home and I noticed they screen-printed the boxes with designs. So I Googled a bunch of graphics that were on the boxes and mocked them up for a series, then I just left them there for about a year. After a while it became time to do a board series again and I came across them and started showing some people, and they where immediately stoked. Then I had to put them out quickly before someone else did it.
I have these phases where I’m super into Google Image searches and I end up making a lot of stuff, but after some time I just end up forgetting about the stuff I made, I have folders with folders in them and in those folders are folders and somewhere in this mess there are some graphics. From time to time I’ll post a photo of those folders on Instagram.

mark

Is it important for you to remain independent?
We are doing okay but because of our independence we are still hustling. About five years ago, me and Steve had a pretty big debt and a friend of mine put in some money so we could keep the company going. But now the company is self-sufficient, there are two people working full time, it’s pretty small. I feel like nowadays a lot of smaller companies partner up with bigger firms like adidas or Nike just to make things a bit easier. We are open to do it but in the end we are focused more on the quality over quantity formula. Plus, we are getting by. And it’s still a great outlet for my creativity so I feel like we will be around for a while.

nardelli-deli

Thanks for the interview, Nardelli.
Thank you!

Interview & photos: Benni Markstein

Behind each and every brand, there is always a brand director. A person who gets the last word on approval to make sure that everything stays in balance. To make sure that quality levels are kept up and every release builds a coherent brand identity. This column is about showcasing those people – and their brands, of course. We want to give you a look behind closed doors, a peep trough the keyhole, or simply, a “Behind The Scenes” of international skateboard companies that we here at PLACE really like.

For starters, here is England’s Isle Skateboards, run by Nick Jensen sitting in London, and Paul Shier with his office in Los Angeles, just to be as close as possible to the skateboard industry’s capital of the world. Small European skateboard companies are experiencing a Golden Age at the moment and everybody seems to want a piece of the pie. Isle Skateboards are ahead of their time and their boards even still look great after you skated them. Here’s the inside scoop on how they do it.

Can you tell me about the first time you met Nick?
I cannot put it down to a specific time and place that I met Nick, but have a fond memory of us skating Paternoster Square in St Paul’s, London when he first got on Blueprint many years ago. He was so small but super humble and loved skating.

You were already involved in the skateboard business with DVS after Blueprint ended. What prompted your decision to start Isle?
I wanted to start a brand that I could feel proud to be a part of, and something that could be ran in the correct manner, which Blueprint was not giving me in the later years. And I it knew it was never going to happen due to the ownership and structure at Blueprint. I wanted to be able to create a brand to represent good skateboarding and great skateboarders, and be a part of a brand that everyone involved with would be stoked to be a part of and on the same page.

Did your experience help you manage the problems that might arise when starting Isle? What kind of challenges did you run into since Isle started?
My experience for sure helped out with starting the brand, it obviously gave me a base knowledge of the business, but the most important part to me was that I was able to form so many strong relationships with woodshops, stores, vendors, and distributors which was something so important to the initial birth of Isle. Of course – just like any small company – we run into some problems but we have been lucky to avoid any major situations so far.

With both of you living in different cities, how do you manage to create a productive workflow and dividing tasks?
With FaceTime, Skype, and email we are able to work together like we were in the same city. And we all know what we want from the brand and work together to make that happen and reach that goal. The world is getting smaller, making it easier to for all of us.

I could see different time zones being a hindrance when the deadline approaches?
I do not see time differences having any hindrance to what we do. All our boards and softgoods are produced in California, so having me out in L.A actually helps the process more than it hinders. I am able to visit woodshops, vendors, and make sure our products are where and how they should be.

You also work as a team manager for DVS and as a professional skateboarder how do you balance those tasks with the work you do for Isle?
It is a balance but I just make sure that on the daily, I am giving my full attention to each of my duties with my life. I love what I do and the fact that I am able to work in skateboarding and able to skate is a blessing. I found a balance and have been able to stay true to it. My wife and I are expecting our first baby next month, so some new balancing will begin (laughs).

When it comes to the visual side of Isle, who has the last say?
Nick Jensen and Chris Aylen are working closely together in London on the creative visual side of the brand, while Jake Harris and Nick overlook most of the visuals for Vase, which is our first video production that we are releasing later this Summer. We all work together on everything, bouncing ideas back and forth regarding all creative output with the board graphics, ads, soft goods etc. and we all have to agree for something to get produced. If one of us is not feeling something, we will just not go forward with it.

isle_artist_series_lee_marshall

isle_pushpull_1

isle_studio_11

Quality is important especially for skaters, how do you manage to keep the quality of your product consistent?
Quality is the most important part of Isle and something that has to be a top priority. We use Generator woodshop (who is the agent for Bareback in the U.S) for all our boards, which I believe to be the best place for skateboard production with the best wood and I stand 100% behind it. Our shapes stay the same so there are never surprises when skating or buying an Isle board. We all talk together with the whole team and discuss soft goods too so that we can come to an agreement with what we all wanted to see going forward have been lucky to have found a great vendor through Josh Stewart (Theories of Atlantis Distribution) to produce and print all of clothing from now on and the quality is going to be consistent with whatever you see coming from Isle.

What has been your favorite thing you have done since you started Isle?
Receiving the first boards and knowing it was real was an incredible moment. Seeing people skate the boards and being stoked is one of the best parts of running a brand to me. Any trip with the boys is amazing; I wish we could do it more! Having everyone out in L.A visiting was pretty special to me. Too many favorites to mention and we are about to have a big one with the release of Vase too so stay tuned.

What is your vision for the future of Isle?
We will continue to keep true in our strong direction with the brand and always produce the best quality goods while supporting what I believe to be the raddest team of skateboarders out there.

by Roland Hoogwater
Photo: Yoon Sul

Behind each and every brand, there is always a brand director. A person who gets the last word on approval to make sure that everything stays in balance. To make sure that quality levels are kept up and every release builds a coherent brand identity. This column is about showcasing those people – and their brands, of course. We want to give you a look behind closed doors, a peep trough the keyhole, or simply, a “Behind The Scenes” of international skateboard companies that we here at PLACE really like.

For starters, here is England’s Isle Skateboards, run by Nick Jensen sitting in London, and Paul Shier with his office in Los Angeles, just to be as close as possible to the skateboard industry’s capital of the world. Small European skateboard companies are experiencing a Golden Age at the moment and everybody seems to want a piece of the pie. Isle Skateboards are ahead of their time and their boards even still look great after you skated them. Here’s the inside scoop on how they do it.

_SAM5367

Can you tell me about the first time you met [Isle co-founder] Paul Shier?
I remember when I met him at South Bank, but for me the most memorable early encounter was on the first Blueprint tour I ever went on. I was listening to his amazing stories while sitting in the back of the van. I thought he had already had such an adventurous life, and I wanted to have similar experiences… well most of them, ha ha!

With Paul and you both living in different cities, how do you manage to create a productive workflow and dividing tasks?
We also work with Chris Aylen and the company is split. Chris lives in London as well, so we work together and discuss our art direction with Shier, who is the boss man. He is in charge of running the brand production, distribution, sales and social media.

_SAM5305

I could see different time zones being a hindrance when a deadline approaches.
The time zone thing is fine, we know that at around 3 p.m. in Los Angeles, which is 11 p.m. GMT, Shier will be on the emails. It’s probably actually a blessing, because you always have room to breathe. You’re not always engrossed in endless phone calls and text messages about small details, we make bolder and more confident decisions this way.

Can you tell us a bit about your daily routine with you being a professional skater, fine artist, and business owner – and the way you balance those activities.
I go through different stages, but I try and paint four days a week and skate after I finish, and on weekends. Then I do chunks of Isle work that I take out of my painting routine.

You have an MA in Fine Arts, so I can imagine this has had a big influence on the way you view “skate art”?
I mean, I have always been drawn to painting, and so I guess I have spent a lot of time engaging with that world, which has a life and a history of its own. I like skate art, I mean everything has its place and context.

_SAM9807

_SAM9775

Do you view your fine art work is separate from your Isle work, or does the work intertwine, if not on a visual level possibly on a conceptual level?
I don’t really see a link between my art work and the work Chris Aylen and I develop for the graphics. I cannot deny that they come from a similar interest in sculptural spaces, however, I think they are more like my Alias, a way to explore other ideas in a more fun and light-hearted manner.

_SAM5280

At the same time, lot of the videos, graphics and ad layouts you’re putting out seem to be influenced by fine and conceptual art. Can you tell us a bit about those influences?
We are definitely informed by the language and presentation of contemporary art. Installing our sculptural works next to white backgrounds is a conscious nod to the gallery wall. There is a conceptual element to our board series’ as well. The “Push/Pull” ones liken the simplest of opposites with the everyday motions of a skateboarder. There are also biographical links in all our boards, you can sense the skaters’ personality and character through their graphics.

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by Roland Hoogwater
Photos: Sam Ashley/Isle

I’ve literally been going on skateboard tours for half of my life now. Ever since I got my drivers license back in 1990, I have constantly been on the road in search of skateable terrain, regularly leaving my hometown with a trunk full of equal-minded skateboard folk.

The first tour I remember saw me and two local homies going North in my tiny Fiat Uno. Not only did we put many miles on the Uno during our adventurous three-day stint into the unknown, we also slept and cooked in it. That kind of road life was absolutely normal to us back then; mostly because we didn’t even think about it. We were inexperienced, hyped on riding Canadian maple boards, and still healthily ignorant. The entire tour had nothing “professional” about it. No strings attached. No trick-manual or to-do-list.

Laif-Draasch
Laif Draasch – FS Boardslide

Nevertheless, I did bring my camera on tour to cover our 50-50s, boneless-ones and early grabs for an upcoming issue of the Zine I was publishing at that time, called Read and have Fun. That was not only the name of my DIY-magazine, but our overall motto back then: To “have fun” skateboarding. We still knew nothing about the concept of ABDs (“Already Been Done” tricks) and other media politics – probably because they just didn’t exist back then. We were just a couple of Freebirds. Absolutely.

Many years, and several ”Freebird Tours” later, I gave up some of my freedom for voluntary captivity by starting my own skateboard company. Of course, I didn’t know at the time that I was about to get my wings clipped. In the early days of company ownership, everything still seemed to be just fun and games. Nothing ”professional” about it. All sessions – no meetings. No pre-book line catalogues. No Fall/Winter collections. No Spring/Summer season – to us, that was just ”Skateboard Season“.

mob-skateboards-alicant

Now fast forward 15 years. Fast forward to today. I still make a fly-by-night living by selling skateboards, but after 15 years of doing this professionally, I know which way most of the cookies crumble in the skateboard marketplace. They crumble mostly at the thin line between caring and not caring. As a skate company, you have to be in the peoples’ eyes, ears and brains – which ultimately will lead you into the comfort of their open wallet. That’s how you make a living selling almost anything – including yourself if you’re a sponsored skateboarder. You need to show off your brand. You have to get people hyped. And one way to reach your target group is by going on a skateboard tour with your teammates.

As opposed to Freebird-style touring, there is actually something professional about it. Here’s the set formula behind how skateboard company tours work: Travel to exotic destinations and get the adrenalin-fueled action covered. Bring home still and moving images. The bigger the stunts, the better. Then get your tour featured in a major magazine. Ten pages. No less.

alicante

Simultaneously, blog, post and Instagram the shit out of the footage you and your team gathered. Edit some video clips. Make sure to keep them under three minutes. Release them within the next two months in conjunction with blogging the second tries and alternative angles on tumblr. Then wait a month – and do it again. And again. And again. It’s like you gotta stir ‘em good if you wanna move ‘em!

cpt.-cracker

People know me as Captain Cracker, and I have never have been a captain known to exploit his own crew. I’m not out there pushing the performance of my team overboard for the sake of publicity. Probably because I’m still clinging to that feeling I had back when I went on those early Freebird trips. Good times over bangers. BBQs over ABDs. But for a skateboard company owner in the digital age, that kind of sentiment is quite romantic. Nothing but an analog luxury, if you look at it from the modern business perspective of things. The omnipresent Internet of today is a multi-headed Hydra always ready to toss its wireless tongue relentlessly at the potential customer. The Internet is the major player in almost every business now – and in order to stay in the Game of Skate you, as a brand or branded skateboarder, have to feed this hunger.

alex-ullmann-wallride
Alex Ullmann – FS Wallride

You have to supply for the demand for anything by everyone. Your brand has to stay afloat in those social timelines, blogs, posts and Google rankings – otherwise you’ll be sinking to the bottom of the digital quicksand and, ultimately, slip into digital oblivion. Millions have already become hooked, so millions of us are feeding that beautiful beast on a daily basis trying to stay within the highest favor of its audience. We all want “Likes” by the thousands, let’s admit it…

Ullmann
Alex Ullmann – FS 5-O

The online world is the Golden Calf of the digital age. Most of us just haven’t yet realized that we have begun to worship it almost above all else. This ignorance of reality is what puts the pressure on us all to perform in the digital realm. We put on a performance, an act, trying to stoke the wireless masses. And in the process, we tend to forget all about just having a good time exclusively by and for ourselves; at least every once in a while. Myself included. In 2013, after a King of the Road-style tour for a major skateboard magazine, I found myself feeling that this had definitely been my last skateboard tour.

The ”Mission Manual”, the book containing our daily challenges for this tour, was the essence of what I had begun to dislike about the status-quo of skateboarding. Always try for the impossible. Not because it’s so much fun but because the gnarlier it gets, the more “likes” and followers your content will be generating. Until ultimately, it will go absolutely viral – get insanely hyped throughout cyberspace – and satisfy millions of people momentarily with a little bit of something.

denkie

So when Archie, our team manager, mentioned organizing another skate tour, I wasn’t exactly all gung-ho about it. I even had doubts about going at all. I didn’t want to see the boys smashing themselves to pieces again for hours on end trying to land that one trick – the one that had never been done before at this spot. ”Can’t we just have stupid fun for once?” I asked myself and then thought: “Yeah! We could, but it would NOT go over so well in the magazine feature of the tour if we didn’t even try to stoke the shit out of the skateboarding world with our performance.”

mob-alicante

”Why not?” the Freebird twittered in response from the left half of my brain. ”We’re fucking skateboarders. We can do whatever we like!”

So that’s what we did! The team and I agreed on going on another tour under the premise that we would keep this tour strictly about having a good time. Thus the title, “Good Times in the Front, Kicktail in the Back!” That was our motto, all the way to Alicante, Spain. And look at us now: Here we are! Full tour feature in a major magazine! Ten pages! No less! And all we did was have some simple stupid fun, just for once in a while.

kerem-elver

Watch out for the footage of this trip – edit dropping tomorrow!

by Cpt. Cracker
Photos: Danny Sommerfeld

Don’t know on what to spend your hard earned money this month? Maybe a camping chair? It’s festival season! A new board? Wheels? It’s skateboard season! Clothing? Here’s our monthly pick of ten items, that are worth shopping:

Board Tired - Sleeping Beauty
Tired – Sleeping Beauty 9.25 – 74,99 Euro

Bones Wheels STF Wieger Annie
Bones Wheels – STF Wieger Annie V4 53mm/ 55mm – 47,99 Euro

Welcome Candy Bars black
Welcome – Candy Bars – 11,99 Euro

Deck Mgenta Collective Dream
Magenta – Collective Dream 8/8.25/8.5 – 65,00 Euro

Caps Doomsayers Snapback (1)
Doomsayers – Snapback – 39,99 Euro

Deck Habitat Davis 3 Day
Habitat – Davis 3 Way – 64,99 Euro

Longsleeves Loser Machine Raleigh
Loser-Machine – Raleigh Longsleeve – 64,99 Euro

Cap Thrasher Rope Snapback
Thrasher – Rope Snapback – 34,90 Euro

CR_lastresort_foldingchair_front
Creature – Last Resort Beach Chair – 34,99 Euro

T-Shirt Independent Salazar Doomsayers white
Independent – Salazar Doomsayers – 32,99 Euro


with friendly support from 24/7 Distribution

Jules de Balincourt kommt ursprünglich aus Frankreich, wohnt aber seit geraumer Zeit in Brooklyn und ist mittlerweile zu einem international renommierten Künstler avanciert. Doch damit nicht genug: Balincourt ist er enger Freund von Spike Jonze und der Girl Skateboards Familie – eine Zusammenarbeit lag also schon länger in der Luft. Jetzt launcht Girl die “Studio Series” – Boards, die von diversen, zeitgenössischen Künstlern designt werden. Ihr ahnt es schon: Jules de Balincourt macht mit der Studio Series 001 den Anfang. Im dazugehörigen Video spricht er mit Spike Jonze über seine Boards und wie es eigentlich zu der Collabo kam…

jules-balincourt

Die Boards sind ab sofort in besser sortierten Shops, sowie online im Crailstore erhältlich.

Element macht gemeinsame Sache mit dem kalifornischen Künstler Jeremy Fish – die gemeinsame Kollektion umfasst eine Pro-Board Serie, sowie ein paar T-Shirts um das Ganze abzurunden. In folgendem Clip wird die Boardserie vorgestellt – Levi Brown, Nyjah Huston, Madars Apse und Mark Appleyard haben ein paar sehenswerte Tricks beigesteuert…

element x jeremy fish

Die Australier von Pass~Port bauen ihr Team weiter aus – neuester Zugang ist Nik Stipanovic, der in diesem Welcome Clip zeigt, wie vielseitig Skateboarding in der heutigen Zeit sein kann – ein echter Allrounder. Die neuen Teamkollegen Dean Palmer, Geoff Campbell, Callum Paul, Josh Pall, Glenn Wignall, Bernie Foo, Juan Onekawa und Trent Evans haben zur Begrüßung auch noch jeweils einen Trick beigesteuert. Nice one:

Letzten Samstag hat in London der Palace Skateboards Flagshipstore seine Türen geöffnet und der kann sich durchaus sehen lassen mit seinem Marmorboden und stilsicheren Einrichtung – Platzangst bekommt in dem großzügigen Laden in der Brewer Street wohl niemand. Palace Gründer Lev Tanju über sein neuestes Projekt: “I’ve been trying to do it for ages, really. I was just waiting to find the right spot. It’s a lot of work, but it’s all fun, really… It’s just a nice spot to hang out at. A skate shop that does everything.” Wer den Store beim nächsten London Aufenthalt einen Besuch abstatten möchte, findet ihn hier:

Palace Skateboards
26 Brewer Street
London
W1F 0SW

Für alle anderen haben wir hier die Bilder.

via palaceskateboards.com

Alien Workshop lebt – so viel ist sicher, ob die Company aus Ohio an ihre alten Glanzzeiten anknüpfen kann – wir wissen es nicht. Was wir bis jetzt seit der Wiedergeburt gesehen habe sieht aber schonmal ziemlich vielversprechend aus: Nach Joey Guavera und Paul Liliani ist mit Frankie Spears gerade der dritte Teamfahrer bekanntgegeben worden. Sein Welcome Part ist absolut sehenswert: BS Smithgrind anyone!?

Brandon Westgate hat seinen langjährigen Boardsponsor Zoo York verlassen und ist ab sofort für Element Skateboards unterwegs. Der Wechsel des Eastcoast Powerhouse kommt ein bisschen überraschend, aber immerhin können wir uns so über einen Welcome Clip freuen, der es in sich hat – wie schnell kann man eigentlich unterwegs sein?

Ich habe es getan – ich habe mir nach langer Zeit mal wieder ein Skateboardvideo bei iTunes vorbestellt. Wieso, weshalb, warum fragt sich jetzt vielleicht der ein oder andere von euch… Guckt euch einfach mal diesen Trailer zum neuen Cliché Video “Gipsy Life” an – vielleicht versteht ihr dann meine Entscheidung. Wenn das nicht wirklich vielversprechend aussieht, weiss ich auch nicht…

“Ten years since the inaugural “Gypsy Tour”—Cliché Skateboards notorious pan-European road trip/survival tour—the company celebrates a decade of scraping by on 15-Euros-a-day and sleeping under the stars by combining it with their 8th full-length video release. Gypsylife—Filmed and edited by Boris Proust—is split between documenting Gypsy Tour 4 (with guest janitor Chet Childress) and showcasing full parts from Paul Hart and Max Geronzi along with heavy footage drops from Kyron Davis, Brad McClain and Adrien Coillard. In the footsteps of Bon Appétit and Freedom Fries, Gypsy Life will introduce an entire new generation of Cliché prodigies to the world, while including hefty Gypo helpings of Lucas Puig, Joey Brezinski, Andrew Brophy and the rest of the Pro team to boot. Get in the caravan! Original tracks by Busy P.”

Vielleicht habt ihr es schon mitbekommen, falls nicht hier noch einmal der dezente Hinweis auf unser aktuelles Gewinnspiel bei Facebook: Dort hast du jetzt die Möglichkeit diese 5 Boards zu gewinnen um sie unter deinen Freunden aufzuteilen. Ab zur Facebook Seite, Post liken und die Homies verlinken, denen du ein Board abgeben würdest, falls du gewinnst. Das Gewinnspiel endet am Montag um 12.00 und hier geht’s zu den Teilnahmebedingungen:

Sharing is caring – Viel Glück!

Dass Christian Roth immer voll Bock hat, wisst ihr ja allerspätestens seit unserem “Behind the scenes” mit ihm – und er macht einfach immer weiter: Heute kredenzt uns der Cracker einen amüsanten Clip mit dem kompletten Mob Team und wir fragen uns… Ach, fragen wir ihn doch einfach selbst:

Bist du eigentlich reich, Cpt. Cracker?
Ja. Ich bin so reich, mir reicht’s quasi. Um ehrlich gesagt zu sein und finanziell konnotiert: nein. Kohlemäßig bin ich weit entfernt von einem Vieraugengespräch mit meinem Bankkundenberater. Mein Leben ist reich an Erfahrungen, Freunden, Kindern, Schallplatten, Büchern, Inspirationen und psychsomatischen Krankheiten. Ich bin glücklich und zufrieden mit meinem Dasein, meinem Dispokredit und einem Fahrrad für jeden Tag. Skateboarding war und ist für mich das passende Spiegelbild zu meinem Lebensentwurf: mach’ was du willst, so wie du es kannst und versuche immer besser darin zu werden. Für mich reicht das meistens zum überleben. Schliesslich habe ich Sinnvolleres zu tun als Geld zu zählen – nämlich Skateboards verkaufen.

crackdoom

Mit Brad McClain hat sich Cliché Skateboards einen neuen Teamfahrer ins Boot geholt, der vor Transitionskills nur so strotzt. Seinen Welcome Part jedenfalls hat er komplett in einer Miniramp abgefilmt und macht dabei eine ziemlich gute Figur:

https://place.tv/tag/skateboards