STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo.—Hundreds of miles from an ocean and in the midst of Steamboat Springs winters, Paul Hobson spends his evenings grinding and sanding away at his line of custom-built wooden surfboards, imagining the waves underneath them when they finally see salt water.
He knows there’s something a little bit strange about that.
“First of all, I’m a terrible surfer,” Hobson said, sitting in his backyard near the shop where his five custom surfboards were born. “I surf maybe six days a year. But as far as personal surfing goes, I see this long trajectory; I like the vibe of it, everything about it works for me.
“Catching that wave . getting tapped into that energy, that’s what got me started.”
His five boards, ranging in length from about 7 feet to nearly 11 feet, will be on display at Urbane this month.
Hobson first laid his feet on a modern foam board about 10 years ago and was instantly connected to the dynamic nature of surfing. As a career carpenter, he looked into the origin of the surfboard in an effort to understand its shape and construction.
He was then compelled to make his own as an artistic supplement to the sharp angles of the finish and furniture work of his day job.
“It’s all fluid curves,” he said about the boards. “It’s more of a sculptural thing.”
He discovered that early surfboards were made from redwood, which Hobson uses sparingly in his blond balsa wood boards. The signature dark red ribs in his boards offer some structural reinforcement, but they are designed as an homage to surfing’s history.
After he made his first board in 2005, he took it to Hahn’s Peak Lake to paddle around and see how it floated and reacted to the small, choppy waves.
“The wood imparts a characteristic that is hard to describe other than it gives you the feel of the wood,” he said. “It almost amplifies everything—certainly the sound.”
He’s surfed on each of his five boards—which are finished with fiberglass and epoxy—on annual trips to California with his wife, Alison, and three daughters, Chloe, Emily and Olivia.
All of the Hobson women have grown used to seeing the boards hung around the house and mounted above their heads.
Olivia said it makes her want to go surfing.
“Maybe you could make me a wooden boogie board?” she asked, looking up at her dad.
Hobson is instead turning to skateboards and has recently finished his first version, which he tested at the local skate park.
While Steamboat may be a winter-first town filled with skiers and snowboarders, Hobson thinks that mountain people feel the same kindred attraction to other board sports as he does.
“Everyone’s part of the same tribe,” he said.
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Information from: Steamboat Pilot & Today,
