Journal
The latest news and stories from our workshop, and beyond.
The latest news and stories from our workshop, and beyond.
Welcome to a new feature in the Otter Surfboards Journal! Every few weeks we will be profiling one of our workshoppers who has spent a week with us, making their own wooden surfboard, shining a light on their journey and experience...
Until 1967, there was no such thing as a longboard. Then the shortboard revolution happened and all of a sudden what had previously been called...
More often than not, when the waves are good and we arrive at our local beach before sunrise to surf before work, we end up parked next to and...
As we near the end of another year, before we start looking ahead to what’s to come in 2019, we like to take a moment to pause and reflect on the...
I’ve spent a fair chunk of my adult life now at sea on wooden vessels – be they surfboards or sail boats. Holding the line of a 5'5, 8kg...
“It has taken seven years to write and it’s only 27,000 words long but I have finally finished the thirteenth book that will have my name on it. It tells the story of the week I spent making the board, and the narrative of that journey is intertwined with the story of the path I have carved for myself while running this company (Unbound). It is the story of a writer who became an accidental entrepreneur who had to become a writer again to...
Every year, as summer gives way to autumn, we invite all of our previous wooden surfboard workshop attendees back to Cornwall to celebrate their...
Last Friday we were lucky enough to host the UK premiere of The Plastic Project’s film Dispatches From a Plastic Planet at our annual Boards, BBQ...
New Year, New Model Sometimes we set out to design and make a new wooden surfboard model, and sometimes one develops seemingly organically. The...
As one calendar year clicks over into the next, we like to take the opportunity to pause and reflect on the twelve months just passed so that we can...
Last weekend, we held our Annual Gathering of Makers. It's a special occasion for us, when we invite all of the makers who have joined us over the past few years to craft their own wooden surfboard back to spend a weekend together surfing, making new friends over shared experiences, enjoying good food and having a few beers. We gather at Dunkirk Farm, where James made his first few wooden surfboards just a mile or so from the site of our...
On Friday June 23rd we opened up the doors of our workshop, and of the Eco Park's barn opposite us, and were joined by an amazing crowd of people for...
It’s easy as a small business to always be looking forwards; to plan for the future and keep on pushing ahead. It’s all too common to overlook...
The 6’10” Jetty was one of the first shapes that we developed here at Otter Surfboards, and it's one of the most recognisable surfboards in our...
One of the really special things about sharing what we do through our workshop courses is the fact that we almost inevitably form new...
This deep into winter many of us rely on the woodburner in our front rooms to provide warmth through cold evenings. At Otter Surfboards we also rely on woodburners of a different sort right through the summer months too. The Woodburner is the larger fish in our range measuring up at 6'4" x 22¼" x 2¾" and is designed with speed in mind, carrying a little extra volume to tackle summer slop or to counteract the extra weight of winter neoprene....
Tonight the clock will tick over past twelve o-clock and we'll all be entering a brand new year. It's a time to be looking forward and making plans...
One of the most important parts of the design cycle is evaluating the final product: does it meet the original design brief and how well does it...
September signals the start of autumn for us here in the Northern Hemisphere. Whilst we cling on to the sunny remains of summer for as along as...
