Finishing Touches on the Set Up Area

The thick rubber sheeting finally arrived from Grainger. We were having a slower day so Dakota and I figured we might as well try to be productive. It took about 5 tubes of silicone, box of short coarse screws and a lot of courage to free hand box cut the rubber matting. We originally wanted to order a single 1/4" thick piece but the shape would cause us to have to order a seriously expensive piece so we opted for 12"x36" sheets. Check it out...


Doesn't Dakota look serious here, it's the shirt. Took us a while to figure out the optimal layout where we wouldn't have a small piece on the perimeter.


Siliconed down and waiting for the screws as we just didn't trust that silicone alone would be durable enough for some of the people who seem to do their best at trashing our shop. Kind of like that mentality where you throw all trash out the window of your car teenage phase, remember those days? Here's the finished product!

Getting Close to Completion

Cactus came by with the last large piece of our counter make over at Southside Skatepark last week.  Took me a little while to find the time to update.  Nice large drawers for the truck boxes, with inlaid Walnut Cactus' a trademark on all the handles.  We are waiting on the sheets of thick black rubber matting coming in from Grainger, hopefully soon.  That will complete our new and improved board build area.  I will put up images of those once I get that installed.
 

Counter Update

Slowly but surely Southside's new countertops are being delivered. Your looking at real red oak, to match the floor. Intricately cut in a radial pattern for the top, and set to match the red oak on the vertical sides. Cactus does amazing work and if your shop is in need of a custom fixture overall, we would be more than happy to provide with his contact info.

Custom Counters Never Hurt Nobody

Check in window corner...












Check out counter...











Yeah Cactus, looking forward to taking possession of those and the rest as they are made complete!

Roman's First Flight

Happened to catch this just after take off. Roman, Janine and I head out to Agenda/Costal Carnage for some work/play out in Hunington Beach, CA. So far the trip has been great but the flight out here was pretty tough. It started with a gentleman's agreement where Roman and I agreed to sleep for 20 minutes before embarking on our 2.5 hour wrestling match. He was good for most of the flight, napping occasionally but was certainly very squirmy and occupied every inch of Janine and my two seat area. Sometimes laughing, sometimes moaning and even crying momentarily just before landing. Glad to be here, wish we could just zip back instead of having to put him through it again. Apparently the lady next to us thought he did great. Seeing as how she is a grandmother, she would probably be a better authority on just how tough or easy he actually was.

Day 1 of a Custom Fixture Build Out for the Proshop

This is Cactus and if you want to get a quality product made the right way, the old way, the artistic way...the way they just don't do it anymore...ask me for his information. Here's images of his warehouse and I am going to try to take you through this process with us over the next couple of weeks.

Southside's "Texas Am Showdown"

I havn't been sleeping well lately after witnessing the carnage at this years...Texas AM Showdown. It was so insane that it has just kept me up thinking way too much while trying to go to sleep. I skated a little bit harder today thinking about it. The John Danielson edit ended up getting posted on Thrasher's website. http://www.thrashermagazine.com/articles/trash/texas-am-showdown-2010/
At this point everything seems that much righter in the world to me. Hope you enjoy it and thanks to Roger Skateboards and Gnarbro!

Es Game of Skate Finals at Southside Skatepark November 6th during The Johnny Romano Skate Jam

Okay, so we have been getting a lot of media attention apparently as of late.  Just had a call from Channel 39 and they are wanting to do a piece on us.  Heres the kicker, Dakota answered the phone, the lady on the line said she would call right back and he didn't catch her number.  Goobye Channel 39 Southside Skatepark piece as the lady has not left us a voicemail or called back, score!  FUEL TV actually ran Volcom's "Wild in the Parks Qualifier" contest segment with Southside Skatepark in it.  Although I have not screened it myself, I am hoping that we are mentioned by name in it.  Reason being is that there have been some questionable coverage of various events here in our park.  Put simply, in segments past we were not a physical location and the events must have been held in someones mind.  ESPN Magazine is doing a piece on skateparks around the nation and we are submitting images to them per their request.  Looking forward to checking that out once it is completed.  Sunday June 12th was THINK Skateboard's demo filmed by John Danielson.  It seemed to become and internet sensation appraoching 10,000 views on our www.vimeo.com/southside account in 48 hours.  Thrasher Magazine put it up on the news feed on the left hand side of their mainpage at http://www.thrashermagazine.com/ .  Then, I am thumbing through the new issue of SkateboardMAG and I find this Es Game of Skate ad.  This is going to sound weird but this was how I recieved the news that Southside Skatepark is the site for the offical Es Game of SKATE finals.  Luckily enough we were mentioned on the offical schedule listing at http://esgameofskate.com/schedule/ , so check for a location near you.  Seems as though they will be held during the Johnny Romano Skate Jam benefitting the Make a Wish Foundation of the Gulf Coast!  We havn't even ever had an offical Es Game of SKATE sanctioned stop here...we always do our homegrown Shut Up and Game of SKATE (which draws over 100 entrants twice a year).  Hey, I am not complaining but if you were manning this ship with us, you might be scratching your head too, don't you think?

Dakota Roberson...Shaun Mefford Photos!

I havn't had much time to update the blog in a while, so here goes...these are some photos of Dakota Roberson skating some fresh new spots around Texas, enjoy.

Stefan is repping a Guru Deck in the new Thrasher Venture Ad!

While flipping through the new Thrasher that showed up in the shop the other day I was checking out the new Venture ad and noticed that Stefan Janoski while not only doing an amazingly high switch crook just so happened to be riding a Guru Khalsa deck.  This just had me so hyped, so I shot a picture of it and texted it over to Guru because sometimes I see things in various publications before he does as when it is your life all the time you probably tend to tune out a little bit.  He texted back "Haha nice.  Sick photo too!"  Anyway, funny thing about it now is that I thought he was riding the ledge and doing a kind of a come from behind up and over switch crook...wrong, Stefan has more pop then that, everyone knows that except me I suppose.  Unfortunately it is sad to say that I might of just dated myself on that one, oh well...so be it.

Southside "Johnny Romano Skate Jam 2010" Festivus Article

This years SkateboardMAG 73 "Festivus" article on the 13th Annual Johnny Romano Skate Jam was right on point.  The photos were great, the session was amazing and we really appreciate the way the article was layed out.  Other publications in teh past have gone so far as to not even mention where the event was held at.  Can you believe that, when we read such article in the past do you know how crushed we were?  Could you imagine dumping upwards of $50,000 in renovations to your skatepark just to not even be mentioned in the article that dropped about your park in the 90 days after the park update.  SkateboardMAG is the best magazine going right now in our opinion, they get it right and get to the point about who, what, where etc.  Thanks so much staff at the SkateboardMAG, you guys are legit, in a time of lameness...

Eazy Dolly X Southside Skatepark Collab filmed by Bigo

Eazy Dolly X Southside Skatepark Collab from Southside Skatepark on Vimeo.

Stefan Black/White Re-Up to say the least!

So we finally recieved a pretty massive Stefan Janoski black/white re-up!  This is the shoe that I have been asked about at least 3-4 times a week with a customer ready to buy in the store.  This is probably the safest bet of 2010, as far as being a buyer for a store is concerned!  Come by and pick up your new favorite pari of shoes when you get a chance, Stefan is a super good guy and so is his shoe!

Warhol X Alien 20 Year Anniversary Decks

When I saw this series in the new DNA catalogs I was really impressed.  In a day and age when logo treatments are the norm and anyone stepping out of the box is running a risk, Alien Workshop is there to remind all of us exactly who and what they are.  We had to prebook a couple sets to make sure that we were able to get a hold of all of them.  One for the house, another for the wall at the shop and one for the rack for people who want to use them for what they were intended.  Hopefully the kids will see the effort put into this amazing series and we will be able to bring them in a couple times with great sell through.  The initial roll out are the Warhol graphics, the team head shots beside them we hope drop later this year as well as they also look really good.  I guess when I made a home made tatoo gun and inked the Alien on my thigh by myself at 15, I was really onto something.  

Something Old Something New

Something old is something new, the irony of 21 years of skateboarding and what this sport stepchild has become.  Who would have thought that 21 years ago, you had to have a vert ramp in your area to be able to..."skateboard."  Today, it has boiled down to simply a smooth patch of concrete with nothing on it at all to have a good time with your friends.  The comforting part of it all is that the escence of the session remains.  Just like vert, people know your name for the things you can and can not do.  People have all kinds of style and ability when it comes down to banging out the same tricks.  So many parallels between what was then and what skateboarding is now but it amazes me that skateboarding as a whole is so far removed from those late 80's.  Sure the legends are still around and some of them are killing it and desreve a lot of respect, but everyone knows skateboarding will never be the same.  So, as a tribute to the changes that have taken place over the last couple decades, we give you Shut Up and Game of Skate.  The image above is the fim positives that will be used to create the tee's that will be given out to all participants at the event on 01.31.10.

Guru Khalsa gets PRO'ed!

So yeah, Guru Khalsa and Daryl Angel are turning PRO for Habitat and we couldn't be happier for them.  Guru literally cut his teeth skateboarding here at the park for years as a young kid.  He killed it back then too, but so many people kill it and get nowhere.  Guru actually beat the odds and is going on to have a PRO career, after already having one of the sickest AM careers.  Super happy for Guru and Daryl, they are both great guys and we wish them all the best.  I guess it didn't take long for 2010 to start getting really good!

Adidas getting it together BIG TIME!

I don't usually product update on here but I thought Adidas deserved a mention as their 2010 Q1-Q4 is really strong.  It really put a buyer's mind at ease and I thought I should take a second to thank them for that.  There are a lot of product's not featured that showed up mid December and sold through quickly.  So we brought those all back for another round, while we drool over Q2's release coming in mid March.  The shoe pictured is their new Adidas SKATE and it is cut really low and priced at $59.99.  Congrats on rolling out a banger guys, thats not that easy to do anymore.