Author: Marcus M | SMH Chief Curator Butler, 1858 (source) Around 315,000 BC, Thag and Zorak, two of the first homo-sapiens, were lounging around their cave dwelling after a long day of hunting and gathering. Bored and armed with highly functioning opposable thumbs, Thag picked up a small stone and pitched it overhand into a …
1930s “Paipo board” (image: Smithsonian) Author: Marcus M | SMH Chief Curator Laguna Beach CA’s South Coast Highway is loaded with all sorts of eclectic shops and galleries. Vibrant displays invite visiting wave-riders to peer through their respective windows while en route to/from Thalia, Rockpile, or another break. On more than one pass I had …
Surf Museum Hawaii (SMH) is building up its ephemera collection. Some of the printed antiquities will be a part of the permanent exhibit, and others will be displayed for one-off and/or rotating exhibits. Vintage travel magazines from about 1901 to 1940 are of particular interest to SMH. The era marked a heyday for mainland-to-Hawaii travel, …
Hobie Surfboards is without question the most enduring brand in surfing. Dale Velzy may have been the first to open a board shaping brick and mortar (1949-50) but Hobie Alter is credited with opening the world’s first official surf shop in 1954. While every other from the era folded with the shortboard revolution of the …
On our schedule of Vintage Surfboard and Memorabilia Auctions (view here) we provided a “gone but not forgotten” shout-out to the Hawaiian Islands Vintage Surf Auction (HIVSA). The HIVSA was a Randy Rarick production that ran biennially from 2001 to 2011. As it name infers, it featured the most impressive collection of vintage surfboards and …
As curators of surf memorabilia, our team is tasked to comb through surf swap meets, antique markets, and private collections all over the islands and coastal mainland. We even pull over at roadside homes and shops when we spy a toasty wall-hanger behind the glass of their respective oceanside properties. There are without a doubt …
Author: Marcus Maraih (@marcus_ocean) Do you know why the team behind Surf Museum Hawaii (SMH) started the project? So we’d have a place to store all of our surfboards! I’m kidding of course (sort of) but it does speak to the spatial inconvenience experienced by vintage surfboard collectors. Life would certainly be much easier if …
Surfers are serious content consumers. We have to be, given that wave conditions rarely cooperate with our idle time. In the beginning, consumption habits generally involve incessant scrolling of video clips (surf porn, etc.), but as we mature we invariably look for something more conversational and informative. Podcasts answer the call, keeping us immersed in …
Author: Marcus Maraih The team at Surf Museum Hawaii (SMH) is haunted by vintage surfboards, surf memorabilia, and related collectibles. We’d be unqualified curators of surf history and culture if we weren’t. While “talking story” with and listening to those who paved the way (along with visits to surf museums on the mainland) have been …
There is no overstating the importance of a surfboard logo, which is ironic given that ancient Hawaiians (the architects of surfing) refused to adorn boards with any markings so as to not disrupt the integrity of the vessel. Since the very first logo (a pre-WWII swastika) was carved into a Pacific Systems Homes Waikiki model …