Celebrating Sunday Surfers: Guillaume’s Wooden Surfboard Workshop Experience

Guillaume is an engineer (he works for an elevator company managing the installation of lift systems in buildings), and lived, studied and worked all over the world before returning to France to settle in Lille in the far north (close to the Belgian border and about an hour’s drive from Calais). He lives a long way from the waves (as the crow flies, he’s closer to Cornwall than to the wave-rich coast of SW France) and so his surfing tends to be restricted to holidays; much the same as so many surfers all over the world. We’re very lucky here to have the beach at the bottom of the hill and to be able to go surfing (work and commitments permitting) whenever the waves are good, but we know that that isn’t the reality for a lot of surfers; having to plan surfs, follow forecasts and travel for waves, maybe even only surfing on holidays, is how so many surfers get their fix. And this is totally fine. We’re all surfers.

Guillaume happily admits to being one such “Sunday Surfer”, building surfing into trips and holidays and spending his free time inbetween running, cycling and playing music – he’s a saxophonist in a jazz band. His first surf on his 8’3” Pieces of Eight will almost certainly be in September at our Annual Gathering of Makers weekend. When discussing how we’d deliver his new board to him after it’s been glassed (normally about six weeks after the workshop week) we mentioned our yearly get-together for past workshoppers, and suggested that this would time in with his board being ready. Having just enjoyed a beautiful Cornish dawn surf, Guillaume didn’t hesitate in deciding to collect his surfboard in person. Anything for another trip to Cornwall! Following that, he’ll likely rediscover the waves of southwest France between Lacanau and Hossegor. One thing is for certain though, Cornwall has cast its spell on Guillaume and we don’t think that this will be the last that we see of him in these waters. And we’re delighted about that.