I met Wee Ming Wong at Pier a few weeks back. He was on his way home from a road trip to Southern California. He is posting a travelog – including some great shots from the Baldy pipeline. invert photo of Wee from the Skull Skates 70s gallery

Sorry about the crappy phonecam photo. I didn’t bring a camera. My favorite detail is the new tombstone at the top end of the street section. It’s near the center of the photo and covered – maybe eight foot tall. Looks like everything is formed up. The tractor was gone.

Northwest Skater has some new photos of the Irrigon, Oregon skatepark being built by Grindline. Brick coping, hobbit doorway, bumpy rock lip. Lots of unusual stuff going into this one.

Airing Friday, February 23rd at 9:00 pm Eastern Time (6:00 pm Pacific Time) and telecast three additional times, Matt Hensley has been a major contributor to everything skate culture from carving pools to rocking the box. Recently making time to get back on his skateboard, Matt shares stories about his H Street days and talks about life after Flogging Molly. Matt’s sponsors include: Duffs, Innes, Black Label, and Gullwing. Plus, we take a look at the work of influential skate photographer, Grant Brittain. And, Braden Szafranski takes Michael Rappaport out for a crash course on the mini ramp.

While we were out… Seattle’s City Center skate park or SeaSk8 as it sometimes gets called, was demolished to make way for a new Bill Gates foundation complex. January 3 of 2007 marked the second time in recent years that the city of Seattle tore down a perfectly good skatepark to appease developers. Of course some might argue that the Seattle Center park was not exactly perfectly good. As with Ballard, more money was allocated to replacing the skatepark. Talk about inefficiency, why not just build two new parks and leave the old ones accessible? It’s clear that I don’t understand or appreciate eminent domain and the wheels of commerce. Pre/post demolition pics, links and more after the jump. [Credits: Demo Picture – Auggiedawg, Fascist Bill Gates – The Software War

Judi Oyama – Judi Oyama was born and raised in Santa Cruz, has been skateboarding for 33 years (currently ranked first in the World in slalom masters), and is an artist and graphic designer for Giro/Bell Sports. Judi worked with local skate artist Jimbo Phillips and concrete artist David Pettigrew to create a proposal for the park’s strongest visual element, the 18′ full pipe. A graphic grey-tone wave illustration will be transferred onto the full pipe using sandblasting and other concrete sculpting techniques. In addition to highlighting the wave form of the full pipe and addressing the park’s proximity to the ocean, the finished piece will also serve the functional need of discouraging park visitors from climbing on the wave form. I didn’t realize the public art aspect of the new Santa Cruz skatepark was done with the help of Jimbo Phillips. Judi herself sent in a link to some shots of the wave graphic preparation. Turns out it was sandblasted. Check it out. Also, check out the Santa Cruz Skate Park Blog.

Psycho Skate from Vision Streetwear, circa 1988. This video is a good mix of Freestyle, Vert, and even some early Snowboarding. It seems like everything back in the late 80s was some sort of bright neon color. Do you remember color-changing shirts? More after the jump.