Board#165: longboard for Jade

 

Jade & her Dragon in Malibu (2017)

Dimensions: 9'0 x 22 x 2 3/4

[completed in August 2017]

The story: Jade heard about me from the Wahine Kai Women's Surfclub and ordered a board for herself and her husband (board#166). She lives in Los Angeles area and the ordering process happened through emails. It is always a pleasure to shape Wahine Kai's members!

The shape: 9'0 longboard single fin with a Vee tail.

The artwork: Jade always had dragons on her boards. I was happy to perpetuate the tradition since I am a big fan of dragons myself! I spraypainted the Beast and Tiger G glassing glassed it with a beautiful polish finish.

board#164: first board for my daughter

Happy

Dimensions: 5'8 x 19 5/8 x 2 1/2
[completed in July 2017]
Model Versatile

The story: my 8 year-old daughter was playing in the white wash in Costa Rica when a girl passed by on her way out to the line-up. That girl was probably 11 year old at most and surfed really good. But the way she looked (down) at Victoria decided my daughter she will surf as good as her one day, or even better! Since that day, and from her own will, Victoria has been surfing 3-4 times a week and compete in regional surf contest. This board was her first one.

The shape: for a first board, the goal was an easy paddle into the waves as a priority. I made an eggy board that had a generous outline but with proper concave on the bottom and a progressive rocker. 

The artwork: I have a hard time saying "no" to my daughter. She knows how to play with the mommy cord... Anyway, she decided she would have food on her board. Her favorite sweets from USA and France: Cupcakes and Macaroons ! I bought the perfect image on a stock website and have it printed on rice paper by Boardlams. Then the magic of my Dewi Malopsi, my glasser and owner of Tiger Glassing, operated. She laid in the printed rice paper on the painted board and added glitter on the pinline ! 

This board is and will always be very special to my heart.

board#163: shortboard for stranger

Dimensions: 5'4 x 18 1/4 x 2 1/8
[completed in May 2017]

The story: sometimes I cut at the wrong dimension. But I can't throw away unfinished blanks. So I finished them. Like that cute little shortboard that found its owner at Encinitas Surfshop.

The shape: improvised shortboard shape to accommodate issue mentioned in the section above.

The artwork: when I have a free pass for artwork, I do my favorite thing: stripes!!

board#162: Switchfoot board !

Dimensions: 5'6 x 19 1/2 x 2 1/4
[completed in June 2017]
Model Voldemort

The story: I love my town. I try to give back to my community as much as I can. Last year, I donate a board for the Ecke Magdalena YMCA which basically raised my children (click here for the story). This time I picked to help my favorite band. Switchfoot is an Encinitas-based christian band who rock not only by their music but also from deeply caring for people in need. Every year they throw a huge free concert at Moonlight Beach to raise money for a cause, usually helping children from our community. During this event, they host a fundraiser party where they auction donations. I made a Switchfoot surfboard for this event. Few days before the auction, Vincent, my husband and I surprised the band during a soundcheck before a Del Mar fair concert. I was so shy that I sent Vincent to hand off the board while I was hiding in the crowd. But Switchfoot frontman, Jon Foreman, paused the soundcheck to thank me for the donation (see video below). Later this week, I hard that the board sold for $1,000 and the couple who bid on it decided to give the board as a present to the Switchfoot who are excellent surfers.  That was the last new about that very special board.

The shape:  I thought the board would need to stand out for an auction and I went for an unusual shape, the Voldemort model I created for my friend Clement. But I made sure the volume would be generous enough to allow the board to be surfed my a majority of potential bidders. 

The artwork: the artwork was a no brainer: Switchfoot logo ! I loved it so much I wanted to keep the board :) 

board#161: egg for Tanya

Dimensions: 6'6 x 21 1/2 x 2 3/4
[Completed in April 2017]
Model Vader

The story: Small world. Tanya is a tandem surfer. I used to be a tandem surfer too but before many years before her. So we never overlapped in the line-up. But our path crossed through surfing anyway. Like it was meant to be. The tandem surfing community is a like a family. Even if we don't know each other we are like "cousins" as we share the same passion in our blood (once a tandem surfer, always a tandem surfer). She expressed her wish to have a board shaped by me. It was such a great pleasure to make her "solo surfing" board.

The shape: As any tandem surfer, Tanya is mainly in the water with her partner on a huge tandem board. It takes a lot of hours of practice and only little left to surf on her own (speaking by experience). Therefore she asked for board with plenty of volume to catch tons of waves when she gets the chance to go out on her own. This egg also allows her to execute cute some turns if needed.

The artwork: Tanya's favorite artist is Chloe Early. She is obsessed with her paintings and asked me to have piece that was particularly meaningful to her on her board. It was tricky for me to blend a rectangle on a surfboard without breaking the lines of the outline. I went for a modern vibe with asymmetrical diagonal painted under the painting (which was printed on rice paper by Boardlams).  By respect for the artist, I contacted her to show the board and she was stoked for Tanya. Tanya was stoked too. I was stoked for Tanya. Therefore everyone was super stoked !

board#160: asymmetrical shortboard for Vincent

Dimensions: 5'4 x 18 5/8 x 2
[completed in March 2017]
Model Versatile-A

The story: Third iteration of the asymmetrical shortboard board model I created for my husband Vincent (see board#100 and board#136). He still loves the benefit of the tail/rail asymmetry (see the shape section) and the original artwork! 

The shape: The idea is to build a board that would have different specifications on the toes/heel sides since the pressure applied is different (more power on the heels, more control on the toes). The toe side has the longest rail and pinched rails for optimized penetrance of the wave while carving a nice arc. The heel side is the shortest for smaller arc to quickly bring the board up to the lip.

The artwork: still using the concept of the shifted stripes which highlights the asymmetry.

board#159: egg for Jeff

Dimensions: 5'9 x 22 1/4 x 3 1/4
[completed in March 2017]

The story: Jeff has been surfing with my husbands for ages. He has seen many of different Mere-Made boards under his feet... until he finally asked me for one :) I am always stoked to see that my shapes are good enough to convince excellent surfers to get one for themselves !

The shape: Jeff is a big guy who loves charging stormy Swamis. He wanted an eggy shape to get into the heavy surf without compromising the maneuverability. We roamed some surf shops to look for the shape and he left an old board he really liked for me to get inspired. The requirements were round tails with a vee and plenty of volume on the nose. Definitely an usual shape which I really enjoyed making.

The artwork: I was free of creating something that would illustrate Jeff's charging skills. I went for a irradiating red stripes on a black/grey fading. Glassing was done by Tiger Glassing.

board#158: shortboard for Paul

Dimensions: 5'6 x 18 1/4 x 2 3/16
[Completed in February 2017]
Vedette model

The story: Paul who has been supporting my shaping frenzy almost since the beginning is now ordering a performance shortboard after having already 4 Mere-Made surfboards !

board#1: egg  #067, 
board#2: "The Pill" #091, 
board#3: shortboard #092
board#4: shortboard #122

The shape: for his 5th board, Paul asked for the every day performance shortboard based on one of my most popular shortboard template, the Vedette. 

The artwork: As usual, Paul nicely gave me full artistic freedom on his artwork (he cares about shape, not much about colors :)). I played with a complex intermingled stripe pattern with 3 colors. I had fun doing it despite the technical difficulty. The color theme was influence by my daughter at the time who just watched Nemo. We jokingly call that board the "Dory" board.

board#157: egg for Carolyn

My daughter wanted to keep the polka-dot board

Dimensions: 6'9 x 21 1/2 x 3
[completed in February 2017]
Model Vader

The story: my friend Carolyn likes to surf funboard shapes (including one of mine: board #021) but needed a shorter board to fit in a small board bag to travel to Nicaragua... with us ! Indeed the Nicaraguan domestic airline Sanza we had to take to reach our destination has very limited "cargo" space and even weights passagers (with their backpacks :)). Making that board for Carolyn was preparing for adventure!

The shape: the goal was to compact the volume that Carolyn is used to surf into a smaller board, keeping all the paddling ability. The other requirement was to keep some rocker for the late drops into steep nicaraguan waves.

The artwork: Since Carolyn is professional flamenco dancer, it was easy to go for the traditional polka-dot pattern that is seen on all the beautiful flamenco dresses. The pattern was printed on rice paper by Boardlams and laid in by my glasser, Tiger Glassing who added a classy pinline.

a bit anxious before the plane ride

The polkadot board being downloaded from the Sanza plane !

Carolyn and I 

Carolyn in action 

Oceana also likes the board 

Oceana stoked on the inside

Carolyn and her family <3

board#156: shortboard for Mark

Dimensions: 5'8 x 19 5/8 x 2 3/4

[completed in February 2017]

Model Versatile_A

The story: I have been making boards for Mark for a while:

Mark's board #1: keel fish (board#009)

Mark's board #2: mini-gun (board#032)

Mark's board #3: shortboard (board#050)

Mark's board #4: shortboard (board#073)

This is Mark's board #5 !!!!

The shape: Mark is an excellent surfer who loves to experiment new shapes. He saw my husband's asymmetrical board and asked to have his own version. The asymmetry is for regular foot: shorter rail on the heel side to allow for narrower backside turns (and hit the lip faster). Rails are also rounder on backside to support the extra weight with more forgiveness. Frontside rail are pinched and longer for nice wider carves.

The artwork: keeping the spirit of the asymmetrical artwork I started on this model with a simple shifted stripe. Easy and efficient: my favorite artworks :)

I met Matt Kinoshita (board#155)

Dimensions: 6'2 x 18.7" x 2.4"

[shaped in December 2016]

Model Velociraptor (from the flash flood warning, blocking the moutain road on my way to Matt's shaping room... I thought I'd see a T-rex crossing the road in my headlights)

The story: Matt Kinoshita is the master shaper and owner of Kazuma Surfboards, one of the most prestigious surfboard brands worldwide, based in Maui. Matt is not only known for his amazing shaper skills but also for openly sharing his shaping secrets on social media. In addition to a Youtube channel, Matt regularly posts on his instagram account to his loyal 31K followers. He honestly tackles some controversial topics of the surfboard industry and teaches his shaping techniques without holding anything back. He also takes the time to answer most of the questions from his followers. Instagram is where I got my golden ticket for Matt's shaping bay... He offered me to come visit him in Maui and I didn't sleep on his offer. I immediatly booked my ticket.  

Few weeks later, I landed in Maui with my respirator in my small luggage. I left my family in CA as I knew it would be an intensive training with Matt for most of the day. I had booked a small room through Air B&B in the mountains. My night table had some local delicacies and ear plugs for the loud roosters singing all night long. My host was a japanese single mom, Tomo. She became my friend as we were sipping local beers and dining together, after a long dusty day. Matt might be a cyborg from the future: he doesn't sleep! The first day, I got a late start, meaning meeting him at 6am. One day he texted me at 4.30am saying he was done with his work for the day and I could come over for training! I remember texting back that I needed to wait for the Starbucks to open (at 5am) to drink my coffee before I could fonction properly :) The 5 days went fast. I was expecting to be watching him running his factory but Matt had planned to make time for me during which he was 100% dedicated to my training. He took on his own time to teach me his legendary techniques while sharing his point of view on the surf industry. My head was hurting every single evening from the huge amount of priceless information I had to digest. I actually took a lot of notes from which I made a powerpoint presentation at the end of the training. Yes, Matt is a living legend of shaping but I has been also lucky to get to know the man behind the mask: not everyone knows it but Matt is also an active firefighter, a highly graded jujitsu master, a family man and of course an incredible surfer. Despite his very complex schedule he managed to make me feel a special guest. I'll be eternally grateful for his welcome.

The shape: of course I got to shape during my training. This board I had to make was a kind of end-of training test. I had to shape Matt himself, his favorite board. Yep. BIG DEAL. He gave me a sheet of paper on which was printed a CNC machine file 3D view of the board with full dimensions. When I shaped that board I was so stressed that I made few mistakes that I spent much time trying to correct. I was bit disappointed with my performance and I could have done much better, at home with my own tools. The board still came out great and I took all the feedback in (more learning !). Matt glassed it to surf it. He said it was a good board. Such a unique opportunity. An honor to have shaped a board on which Matt put his logo next to mine.

The artwork: Just plain white. Because the goal was shaping, not spray painting. Actually our two logos looked so good that no artwork was needed.

with his son, operating the CNC machine

Matt gave me some home work !!! :)