Michelangelo once said, "I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free." A surfboard shaper/designer does much the same thing; painstakingly whittling a block of foam until everything is taken away but the board. The boards themselves are "working" art, form and function inextricably bound together. The art of surfboard design itself is an anachronism in the age of automation, the craft passed from shaper from shaper, learned by direct experience, sweat, and error. In our quiver, we offer a collection of classic and contemporary wooden boards found nowhere else on the Internet.

hobie alter

Dig deep enough into any Sixties shaper's past, and you'll turn up the name "Hobie Alter." Brilliantly inventive, Hobie was one of the leading innovators in surfboard materials...

robert august

Robert "Endless Summer" August was born in Hermosa Beach in 1944 and yet was still only the second surfer in the family (after his father). After a stellar competitive career...

bear

Shaper and surf impresario Randy Rarick got his start patching dings for Greg Noll Surfboards in 1964 (earning the name "Super Patch") and became a Hawaiian state champion in 1967...

gordon & smith

College classmates Larry Gordon and Floyd Smith started blowing foam surfboard blanks in Floyd’s garage back in 1959. Two years later, the Gordon & Smith (G&S) label was...

bill hamilton

Billy Hamilton grew up in California and surfed the entire coastline in the 60s. It was only natural that his evolution as a surfer would take him to the North Shore...

rich harbour

In 1959, Rich Harbour's used longboard was stolen from his garage. Devastated, Rich decided to build a new board on his own. Using a piece of redwood, and huge rubber bands cut....

hap jacobs

Hap opened Jacobs surfboards in Hermosa Beach on Pacific Coast Highway in 1959. Business was good and then it was great and then it was ridiculous. "We were there...

bob mctavish

Bob McTavish was born in Australia, and took to the sea completely by the age of 18, exploring the endless miles of good surf along the coastlines of New South Wales and Queensland...

mickey munoz

Once described as the "surfer's surfer" Mickey Muñoz has been riding waves since the Fifties. Equally adept in both big and small waves, the Orange County local won...

johnny rice

Johnny Rice hewed his first board out of balsa “repurposed” from an old Navy raft in 1949. The first attempt was, by his own admission, awful. His shaping education took on...

dale velzy

On the family tree of surfboard shapers, one would put Dale Velzy right at the top—along with legendary designer/shapers Bob Simmons, Joe Quigg, and Matt Kivlin...

renny yater

Born in Los Angeles in 1932, Reynolds "Renny" Yater started surfing when he was 14. He started production shaping surfboards in 1953 at the age of 21, but not under his name...

malcolm wilson

Longtime surfer Malcolm Wilson takes surfing's grand historical canvas and renders it portable. Painstakingly crafting...

ART FOR GOOD KARMA

Artist Micaiah Hardison and SurfAid are partnering to improve the health of the isolated folk connected to us through surfing. Micaiah is offering up the proceeds from the sale of this original artwork.

view and purchase the painting here

find a new, used or custom board

Whether it's by providing the finest custom surfboard available, or by providing mind blowing fine art and surf photography we invite you to drop in, stall awhile, and enjoy the view.

browse our surfboards