While digging around on Julien’s auction site after the insane $115K Tony Hawk auction found a separate collection of listings titled Vintage Grails of the 70’s and 80’s and decided to see if there was anything interesting. It was quite a chore to sift through the 332 lots, and just as the tedium was about to win I spotted the thumbnail of what looked like a pretty cool old G&S team shirt from the 70’s and a Nash… hold on, that’s a Skate and Annoy shirt! The auction lisitng only says Nash because the topless lady had Nash logo pasties covering her nipples. At the time that illustration was used as the intro to a Nude Bowl trip I made in the late 80’s. The Nash logos worked great in this context because at the time we felt like Nash boards were cheap and exploitive, so it made sense with the graphic. Was there more than meets the eye on this graphic? Sure. Were we also essentially adolescent, immature young males at the time? Definitely. What cracks me up is someone at the auction house had to place this shirt on a mannequin and professionally photograph it. WHOSE COLLECTION DID…

There was a time when a skateboard selling for $6,000 at auction would raise eyebrows. I’m not sure what to make of this insanity. The Tony Hawk’s 900 Collection bids closed at Julien’s Auction and some skateboards and related paraphernalia sold for some truly astounding numbers. So astounding that it makes you wonder if Julien’s is a real thing or not, but it is. The deck Tony Hawk landed his first 900 on sold for $1,152,000. That cannot be right. Is it right? How about 57k for a pair of sweaty kneepads? Some of this might make sense conceding the proceeds are going towards Tony’s charity, The Skatepark Project. My first thought was that somebody or some corporation bought these items at knowingly inflated prices with an eye towards deductions, but you can only deduct the amount you overpaid for the items, and the IRS bases this off the items value listed the auction catalog. In the case of the the 900 board, the estimated value was between $500,00-$700,000. That deduction could be worth less than half of what they paid. It’s also worth noting that the auction listings state that “a portion of the proceeds” will go to the…

Smile On Your Brother is a skate art auction to benefit Contributor, a Canadian initiative to donate skateboards to kids who can’t afford them. Looks like starting bid is $125 but hey, they’re completes! Featured board is by Devin Barrette. Auction runs between August 24th and October 25th, 2009.