Wooden Surfboards
Drift Wood

Thread barrels on a handmade, high-performance wooden surfboard

By Mark Anders
Photo by James Westman

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(click image to enlarge)
Baywatch’s finest would not have appreciated early surfboards—huge planks of balsa and redwood that required a couple of strong lads (precursors to dudes) to heave them to the water. During the 1950s, these cumbersome slabs were gradually replaced by lighter, more maneuverable polyurethane foam, still the norm in surfing today. Consequently, timber-built boards are now rarely used for anything more than wall art, much to the dismay of San Francisco–based surfer and craftsman Danny Hess.

Using reclaimed and sustainably harvested poplar, amapola, and cork, Hess handcrafts high-performance wooden surfboards. He starts with a solid wooden perimeter skeleton, inserts recyclable EPS foam hand-shaped to create the deck and bottom, and finishes it off with a poplar top skin an eighth of an inch thick. Each board can take 14 hours to build, but the result is a longer life span than epoxy foam, because the wood won’t break down as quickly over time. More important, Hess’s boards easily match conventional ones on the water.

Our favorite model is the Quintara, a fast and maneuverable shortboard with a full, floaty feel that makes paddling into waves easy. Plus, it looks just as good carving a big bottom turn as it does perched delicately on your wall. $1,300; hesssurfboards.com
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