Journal
The latest news and stories from our workshop, and beyond.
The latest news and stories from our workshop, and beyond.
The community of surfers who have passed through our workshop over the years is a beautifully broad spectrum representing the 21st Century surfer. Over the course of their week spent making and shaping a wooden surfboard conversations often touch on how a person came across us, and why they ultimately chose to spend a week of their holiday with us in the workshop rather than ordering a custom surfboard or buying “off-the-rack”. These...
Spending a week making a wooden surfboard here at Otter is, for most people, going to be a step away from their day-to-day. The differences between...
Our August Bank Holiday workshop had a little bit of everything in it, and as such was a fantastic representation of what makes our “Make Your...
It feels somewhat counterintuitive to drive away from Cornwall and head up to London in the middle of August, but last weekend that's exactly what we...
Chris and Rikke drove from Denmark to make their own surfboards with us last week. They took their time and made a road trip out of it, spending some...
The week of June 19th-23rd was the ideal time to be in Cornwall as the southwest basked in a heatwave that included the hottest June day since 1976, and there was a lovely pulse of swell at the start of the week. Keijo, Rich and Tim spent this week in Cornwall, and although they were in the workshop for a lot of the time gluing, planing and sanding the wooden surfboards that they were making, there was a good four hours usable daylight on either...
Mike and Peter travelled from Guernsey to join us at the workshop the week before last; it was the last week of Peter’s school Easter holidays,...
Ordinarily, it’s only James who keeps a pencil tucked behind his ear. This past week though, all three workshoppers arrived with the same habit; a...
One of the questions that we always ask anybody who joins us to make their own wooden surfboard, is where they think they’ll have their first...
A couple of Saturdays ago we packed the workshop into the back of the van and drove half an hour up the coast to Watergate Bay Hotel for our first...
Last week the workshop doors here were flanked on a daily basis by two pairs of boots drying in the sun, and an enormous (yet beautifully docile) Great Dane named Huxley. Inside, James (Huxley’s human) and Will worked away at crafting their own wooden surfboards, an 8’0” Pieces of Eight and a 6’10” Jetty. James and Will were both staying down in Porthtowan and every morning they walked the steep path up the side of the valley and over...
Our “Make Your Own Wooden Surfboard” workshop courses have become a core part of what we do here, and as with every thing somebody had to be the...
When a person says that they intend to take a blowtorch to their freshly finished wooden surfboard before it goes off to be laminated, you could...
Neither Brian nor Ben are strangers to working with their hands to create something; Brian is a garage owner and mechanic from North Wales who...
No two workshops are ever the same, and the people that arrive here on a Monday morning and end up stood out in front of our big blue doors holding...
During the last week of September, we were joined by Jac, who was celebrating his 21st birthday by making a 5’10 Fetch with us. He travelled to us from West Wales in his pop-top T25 with his girlfriend, Fliss, in which they’d be spending the week camping and dodging the wind and rain that peppered the week. Being autumn, none of the weather stuck around for too long though, and we enjoyed many spells of sunlight streaming through the...
Having somebody join us from overseas for a workshop week to make their own wooden surfboard is not uncommon, but having a completely...
We've spent a fair bit of time over the last month loading and unloading bits of our workshop in and out of the back of our van, as we've spent a...
Our friend Tony had quite the complete workshop experience with us over the first six months of this year; he fitted in sessions and days at the...
