VIMBY has a short feature on Portland’s longest running skateshop, Cal Skate. I think I actually mail ordered one of my first real skateboards from a Cal Skate advert in the back of Thrasher back in the 80’s. I remember being perplexed finding out they were actually in Oregon instead of California. Well that mystery is explained at last. Once again, Paul Fujita is the mouthpiece of Cal. He’s hell bent on promoting local skateboard companies in every media piece he does, and once again Steve and I owe him something nice…

[Source: EPM]

Last year’s New York Toy Fair turned up this amusing iteration of the alternative skateboard, the Swerver Ultimate Carving Streetboard. I find this amusing if only for the fact that they adapted RipStick or Hurricane wackyboards to make them look more like a skateboard:

The advantages of longboarding and skateboarding combined into one.

Whether you want to go cruising down the street or tackle a new obstacle course, the Swerver is the only board you’ll need. The Swerver Ultimate Carving Streetboard combines the advantages of a longboard with those of a skateboard. The rider propels the Swerver Board forward using a twisting motion, eliminating the need to push off the ground every few feet.

Set up complicated courses, perform tricks off the half-pipe or just fly effortlessly to your next destination. With the Swerver Ultimate Carving Streetboard, the journey is the fun.

Somehow a whole year passed without the Swerver becoming a;ll the rage. I can’t even find an official web site for the product. See it in action after the jump. I can’t wait to perform some tricks “off the half-pipe.”

– Thanks to Concretins for the tip.

When he’s not getting accolades from the skateboarding industry in the form of honorary pro models, Grant Brittain is getting props from “the worldwide leader in sports” aka ESPN, who has posted an online gallery of JGB photos. That’s Neil Blender skating the Seylynn skatepark snake run in Vancouver, BC up top.

Hugh Holland shot a lot of skate photos in the 70’s. There are some great shots online at Lifelounge. The best part was is that they aren’t a subset of the same photos of the era that have been making the rounds for the past decade. Holland came to shoot skaters after already being a photographer. So, aside from the skate photos, a lot of Holland’s shots are taken from more of a photojournalist’s perspective. The Lifelounge post is over a year old. Hugh’s had some exhibits and possibly a catalog from the show published. I can’t find an active official web site for Hugh, and everyone seems to point back to the Lifelounge collection. It’s good stuff. Check it out.

It’s getting hard to remember what we’ve covered already. I could have sworn we did this one already, maybe that’s becasue it reminds me of the one that looks just like this, but with a motor. This one comes from Italian designer Francesco Sommacal who apparently won an international design award for this wacky skateboard called the 360. The web site has Extreme!™ Italian Nu metal rap.

[Source: Dezeen]

Take a piece of plywood, a 2×4 and the trucks from some dimestore skateboards and you’ve got a trolley for ditch surfing. It’s not much different from the plans I’ve seen in various places online for making a camera dolly. Listen, I’m flying home all day today, and I needed something quick. Drainage ditch luge instructions online at Instructables.

The best thing about this 1985 commercial for Mountain Dew is the overlay that says “NOT FOR AIR.” A coincidence, of course, but still funny. That means this was probably digitized from an ad agency reference tape. I don’t recall ever seeing this on TV, but perhaps it did. I see Tony Hawk in there, as well as a Madrid freestyler.. Bob Schmelzer? Who is doingthe sliding and wearing the cowboy hat? I leave it to you to fill in the blanks. I know the first thing I think of when I hear the word “country” is a bunch of good old boys street skating down the gravel roads. Yee haw!

[Source: Heavyset]

Since there’s no date on this guerilla art installation by Madrid artist SpY, we can’t say whether his ramp reinterpretation in his Urban Furniture collection was something he conceived before or after he saw Conahan’s very similar vision. Still, the soccer field painted on a miniramp is pretty clever. I just saw a graphic on the the web that showed a soccer player kicking a ball and an American football player running with a football side by side. The caption under the soccer player said “foot ball.” The caption under the Dallas Cowboy said “hand egg.” Check out SpY.

Yesterday’s park overview was part one. Part two features the local fauna (no flora) as they inhabit the J.M. Berlin skatepark in Englewood, Florida. Check out the action after the jump.

January 2009. The economy might be in the toilet, but you wouldn’t know it on eBay. There were some BIG auctions that went off this month, and a lot of cash thrown around. Maybe it was early tax refunds; maybe it was just a case of right place, right time, but whatever the case, it was an exciting month.

Let me just say something though, something that is really starting to bug me. Sellers, please do a modicum of research before you set your prices. I’m really getting tired of seeing the same decks up, month in month out with the same ridiculous prices. Hello, McFly, your Lance Mountain “family” deck is not going to sell for $200, it doesn’t matter how many times you keep putting it up there. If you did 5 minutes of research you’d see that about 5 family decks went off in the last 2 weeks, all selling in the $50 range. So why you think people are going to pony up 4 times what it’s worth is a freaking mystery. Also, if I see that red Chris Miller “dog” at $500 again I’ll scream. It’s been up for like 3 months. Nobody is going to pay that! To keep putting it up month after month at the same price is plain silly. And another thing while I’m ranting. Can the guy that’s cutting up old magazines and auctioning them off, 1 page at a time kindly stop? Nobody is interested in your piece of crap $9 auctions. We could buy the magazines for that. Just stop. And enough with the deck shaped stickers too. Just stop that shit already.