laid-out-magazine-issue-1

How did you get into custom creating your
own boards and who taught you this trade?
You know man! Back in the day, 75ish, I was the kid
who had the engineering mind wanting to know in
boards that I saw, which at the time was a board with
clay wheels. We were putting boards together with
old skates that had steel wheels and I started trying
to create my own boards. My dad had a saber saw
and he would cut me loose in the garage and I didn’t
interfere with anything and I had creative juices
flowing. And with taking art classes early on in junior
high, high school, I just started getting creative.
I was the kid who took the serving trays from the
restaurants and started gluing the trays together to
see if I could come up with a fiberglass board and of
course over the years G&S did that.
What makes your boards different than the
other boards that are out there right now?
Made with love brother! I was once told anyone could
put the ingredients of the recipe together and come
up with a dish, but if it’s made with love it tastes
extremely well. So all my boards are made with a
personal touch as if it’s my first or my last.
Love is very important?
Absolutely!!!
Would you ever streamline the production
of your boards?
Man I’m always up for streamlining the procedures
and things to make things better. I don’t think I will
ever mass produce. I don’t think that’s what OFCS
is here to do. That being said, I don’t look at OFCS as
being a company that’s in competition with anybody.
I am a custom board maker and my whole purpose
is to make each board on a personal basis. So I would
definitely streamline my procedures, update my
equipment and make things a little easier, but I think
I will always be making custom boards.
Most of your boards have unique designs on
the bottom of them and have seen the first
generation designs and the new generation
designs and how they have evolved. What
inspires the design on the bottom of the
boards?
There again, the skating industry has always dictated
what we ride and what we look at on the bottom
of the board. I just wanted to be different and in the
early days of course it was just something and am a
real big fan of abstract art. So therefore seeing some-
Photo: Ant