utopos

OWL Skateboards present ▤UTOPOS▤

 

 Our friends over at OWL Skateboards have dropped a brand new video dubbed 'Utopos', and with it an accompanying zine and limited edition board series.

 Inspired by brutalist architecture, the board graphics are a result of a collaboration between riders Chris Price, James Griffiths and Daryl Mersom, exploring the "dystopian image of brutalism, despite an attempted utopian purpose". The 10-minute clip, filmed by Stefan Darque and edited by Al Hodgson, features riders James Griffiths, Jim Silver, Francis Peters, Joe Coward, Al Hodgson, Daryl Mersom, Edi Poolay and Billy Trick out in the streets of Bristol and Brighton.

Watch the full clip above and head over to www.owlskateboards.co.uk to scope the zine and pick up a limited edition deck, available now.

 

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Watch: PROLEFEED: OWL in BDX

 

Our friends over at OWL Skateboards have come through with a brand new edit to mark the release of their new, limited edition 'PROLEFEED' graphic from artist Andrew Finch. 

The 8-minute clip filmed by Stefan Darque and edited by Al Hodgson, follows team riders James Griffiths, Jim Silver, Ben Woodhouse, Ed Pooley, Al Hodgson and Dexter Daniels, as well as cameos from Colin Read, Charles Badi and Tom Mangham, as they hit up the streets of Bordeaux on their trip earlier this year. 

Watch the full video above and keep an eye out for an accompanying zine from the trip which will be dropping in the new year. To pick up your limited edition 'PROLEFEED' deck, head over to www.owlskateboards.co.uk

 

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OWL Skateboards drop NEW_SPEAK online

 

OWL Skateboards have dropped their latest visual offering 'NEW_SPEAK' in full, online for the first time. Shot in VX by videographer Stefan Darque, the video takes an "lo-fi approach, analog motif, and Orwellian undertones of a dystopian contemporary England", and features full sections from riders Jim Silver, Al Hodgson and James Griffiths amongst others. To commemorate the online release, OWL have also released a limited selection of their Parliament board series, as well as hard copies of the video which are available to buy on their online store. Be sure to check out the accompanying zine which is available to view HERE

 

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Watch: ♃ – Owl Skateboards

 

Our friends over at Owl Skateboards have just released a new street edit through The Green Zine, giving us a preview of what we can expect in their full length video dropping in 2016. The short clip features riders James Griffiths, Al Hodgson, Jimmy Silver, Jon Faulkner, Nile Bridgeman, Tom Zelenka and Harry Coward hitting various spots around their native city of Bristol.

Enjoy the full video below, shot by Stefan Darque and edited by Al Hodgson. Head over to www.owlskateboards.co.uk for more.

 

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OWL Skateboards 1.6.1.0 series

 

Bristol’s OWL Skateboards come through with an awesome new deck series and accompanying apparel collection for the Summer dubbed the “1.6.1.0” series.

Drawing influence from the study of Jovian astronautics and the 4 Galilean Satellites, Owl link up with local designer Chris Price to produce these intricate designs and apply them as four linking deck graphics, as well as minimal graphic prints on a concise collection of staple apparel items. To celebrate the release, they have also put together this short promo video made up of a montage of skating, art from the release and vintage footage that showcases themes collection.

The OWL Skateboards 1.6.1.0 series is available now over at www.owlskateboards.co.uk

 

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OWL Skateboards ‘MDCX’ edit

 

Our friends over at Owl Skateboards have released this teaser for their upcoming MDCX | 1610′ series that is scheduled for release this Spring.

The Bristol based outfit present this short edit filmed edited by Al Holdgson, incorporating cosmic vibes, which could be a sign of things to come for the series? It follows riders Al Hodgson, Luke Frisby, Jon Silva, James Silver and James Griffith at Bristol’s Dean Lane skatepark.

It’s all being kept fairly under wraps in terms of the upcoming release but be sure to follow the brands instagram page to keep up to date with their latest movements. For more information on OWL Skateboards, head over to website here: www.owlskateboards.co.uk

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out our interview with Al Hodgson on OWL Skateboards to find out more on the brand HERE.

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OWL Skateboards – Interview

owl_02Coinciding with this year’s international go skateboarding day on the 21st of June we had the pleasure of witnessing the release of OWL skateboards’ latest run of graphics, the ‘Parliament’ series. Alongside this came their first promo video featuring a recognisable variety of household spots from our very own Brighton. We sat down for a chat with Al Hodgson, a key member of the team at OWL to tell us a little more about the new company and it’s direction. 

Hi Al how’re you doing? Owl describes itself as a ‘creative collective’. Could you tell us more about the ethos and origins of the company?

 Hey man, I’m doing great thanks, enjoying the sunny weather for a change…Basically, OWL was started by Stefan Darque, a good Bristol-based friend of mine, as an alternative approach to supporting artists through skateboarding and vice versa. OWL’s aim is to act like a skateboard based, art printing company; treating boards as artist’s ‘prints’ and giving them a cut of every board sold as opposed to a flat payment for a graphic series. Consequently, a strong focus is put on the artist and other creative endeavours, moving away from a more conventional ‘team rider’ approach. We’ve still got skateboarders involved in the company and riding the boards, but they are more part of the collective; representing us and contributing to the creative direction of the company as a whole.

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We’re not the only ones who seem to love the new ‘Parliament’ series graphics. How did your collaboration with the artist Mike Nicholson come about?

‘Rough’ Mike has been a good friend of mine for the past few years now through skating in Brighton. He’s done a bunch of artwork in the past collaborating with board companies; doing a lot of the early Heroin graphics as well as a bunch of other projects, so he’s no stranger to it. His work’s intricate and rad and it really fit the aesthetics we were aiming for, so he was just the natural choice for this series. I fully recommend people check his stuff out, he’s the man.

The illustrations themselves are great, did you have that direction in mind beforehand or was there input from everybody?

 Well there was a fair amount of discussion between Stefan and I from the start about the graphic direction to take the first run and what was decided on took a while to refine. But the inspiration basically came from aged reference books and ornithological encyclopaedias from the early and mid 20th century; with the intricate black and white drawings you would often have beside passages of text or information about a particular species. It’s a dated style of drawing you just don’t really see anymore and so we thought incorporating that into board graphics would look rad. We ended up buying a bunch of old books for aesthetic reference and once we’d decided on a structure for the graphics, we approached Mike to see what his take on the idea would be.

 

☽ NOCTURNIS ☾ from Owl Skateboards on Vimeo.

The promo video ‘Nocturnis’ as well as all the photos we’ve seen so far are shot at night. How does that tie in with the theme of the company?

 A big part of OWL’s aesthetic is that all our visual content will be at night to adhere to the majoritively nocturnal nature of owls themselves. Owls hunt for prey under cover of darkness and in a similar respect we ‘hunt’ amongst architecture. I’ve always been inspired by groups like the Minuit movement and had an affinity to the alternate vibe created by nocturnal side of skateboarding, so Stefan and I felt that would be an apt approach to take the visual element of OWL.

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What’s the next step for OWL? Are we going to see any collaboration with new artists in the near future?

 As of now we’re just pushing this series and getting OWL a little more recognised, and we’ve had a bunch of support from all sorts of cool places, which we’re super grateful for.

In terms of the future though, we’ll be working on a bunch of new video projects in the coming months and we’ve already started work on our next run which we’re really excited about. We’ll be collaborating with a new artist and working with a very different style, but as of now it’s all still undisclosed…

Don’t forget to check out OWL skateboards on Facebook and Instagram for more information on where to grab one of these rapidly selling boards. We’re looking forward to seeing them launch into what we foresee to be a bright future as a fresh face in the ever-growing industry that is skateboarding.

You can pick up one of the new boards at the following stockists;

Select

Level

Nvmbr

Iklect

Campus skate store

Altar skate store

 For more information contact: stefan@owlskateboards.co.uk

Owl ‘Parliament’ series

 

Words: James P.Lees

Imagery courtesy of Owl Skateboards