My Last Days in SoCal
"The Big Takeover" at The Fast Life store was awesome! Check out Joshy's blog and The Fast Life site for the lowdown. Huge thanks to all of you that made it down there. Good times!
Most of the REBEL8 crew headed back to SF on Sunday, but I stayed a few extra days to visit friends and see more of LA.
On Monday afternoon I checked out the Huntington Gardens. I love cactus!
That night I hooked up with some of LA's finest at Cafe Gratitude. I love eating vegan!
Big up to the homie Matt for the photo.
On Tuesday afternoon I drove up to Santa Barbara to get a tour of the Powell Peralta skateboard facility. My friend Cat works there and offered to arrange a tour for me. I was really excited to check it out since I've been riding Powell Peralta skateboards and wheels for over 25 years. It was like getting to visit Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. I geeked out on this original Bones Brigade t-shirt. That shit's official!
It was amazing to see the process of building a skateboard from scratch.
The best part was the concave molds, but I wasn't allowed to photograph them. I love old school concaves!
I also got to see the print room, which works way different than the way we printed skateboards at Think back in the mid 1990s.
The wheels manufacturing area was rad too. These are the molds that the urethane is poured into.
The wheels look like this when they come out of the molds. Notice how one side is flat.
A special router shapes the flat side into a smooth radius. The router peeled the urethane off these black wheels in super thin ribbons.
After a tour of the shipping department (where I couldn't help but grab some product for myself), I headed out to meet Vernon Courtland Johnson, one of the original Powell Peralta artists. We hit it off like we'd known each other for centuries.
It was so cool to meet a guy who's art has inspired me since I was a teenager. Ever seen these before?
It was even cooler to see that we are such kindred spirits. You'll be seeing more of VCJ on the blog in the future. He rules.
I didn't want to get back to SF super late, so I left Santa Barbara in my sweet rental car at 5pm. I caught this amazing sunset at 6:30. Wow.
I love California!