I was lucky that I had a lot of dads old templates and even luckier that a lot of mine fit in to dads templates.
#AKU SHAPER TEMPLATES PLUS#
I make enough money for me, plus I have downtime to pursue my other interests. I’m at my peak at the moment, I don’t want to do more than 10 boards a week because it becomes a headache and the attention to detail wouldn’t be as great. Will you keep shaping for the years to come? The most creative outlet I’ve found has been shaping.
I’m looking at creating a few tee’s and maybe some boardshorts for the shaping brand but that’s about it. The world doesn’t need another clothing label (laughs) and I don’t need to be involved with one. Will you ever get involved in another clothing brand? There was a huge gap in the market back in the early 2000’s for custom boards and I’m a huge fan of family business and small business so I’m very passionate about what I do. I do about 10 boards a week, 98% customs. I’ve been lucky to be on a steady increase from about 2006. The Surfboard shaping industry is so fickle. The deal I have with Rhythm now is as an Ambassador so if I have designs I can take them in whenever. The good thing about the graphic design gig is that it fits in with the shaping schedule. After a while I opted out and went back to shaping then in about 2008 I went back to Rhythm as a Graphic designer. I was basically designing the Graphics while Jamal was designing the fits and patterns. Within 2 years it was turning over a lot of money. In about 2002 I started Rhythm with 2 other guys, about 6 months later we got Jamal Grey involved and some investors which made it a pretty fast growing company. You were a co – founder of Rhythm, how did that come about? Over the last 7 years I’ve built up the shaping business to be something that I can afford to do 95% of the time. In about 2005 though, dad stopped shaping after he broke his collarbone, which affected a nerve holding up his diaphragm, so I basically took over operations there and from then on I’ve found myself doing both. I did that for a while, and then went back to graphic Design. He was hand-planing and roughing them out then I would finish them off. In my early 20’s I decided to start shaping. I started working with Billabong in the Art room at around 16. Watching my dad work as a production shaper turned me off shaping a little bit back then, so I pursued the Graphic Design path. Being a surfer I think everybody gets the inclination to make his or her own board. Meanwhile, my Dad was shaping so I would be there scoping around wanting to get involved. I left school in year 11 and went to work at Print 'n' wear working in screen printing etc. I was more into graphic design in the early years. That’s the benefit of working for yourself. It’s refreshing for the mind and a fun thing to do. I was riding my dad’s boards but he never gave me a brand new board, just some second hand ones. I didn’t start surfing religiously until I was about 12.
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