The Snowboard Subscription is the future of shred. Opening up access to the snowboards you want when you need them is a very cool and fun way to invest in your snowboard life. It’s also practical. You shouldn’t be stuck with one snowboard all season. That is definitely the utility that drives our vision. Community and culture is equally important to our vision and last year our community of subscribers and others that reached out asked for a wider snowboard for those with bigger feet. We agreed! Immediately we started engineering the new Wide Wise. Back to the future of shred, we can and will work with our community directly to build what you want. Yes, we will build what we want as well, but if there are gaps in our line or you feel strongly we should add a new board that isn’t offered, send us an email or hit us up on FB messages and tell us what you’d like. You never know, we may get inspired and start engineering it for production right away!
The Wide Wise is an epic all mountain machine that was developed to be fast, stable and poppy under any conditions. It comes in two sizes 157, which has a 26.2cm waist and a 161cm, which has a 26.4cm waist. It is a true twin with traditional camber. Triaxial glass on top and bottom along with the spruce/poplar core make this board stable and reactive on all types terrain. We asked our friend and Artist Erik Abel to throw the graphic on it and in record time he gave us the Wise Owl, which we absolutely loved.
Here are a few questions I threw at Erik to give us a little more insight.
1. Where are you from?
I currently live on the beach in Northern Oregon but was born in a little town near Ventura, CA. I've traveled and lived all around the world but I haven't found any place I'd like to call home forever, but that's OK, I think I'd go nuts living somewhere forever.
2. What do you do when you’re not painting or drawing?
In the little free time I have outside of working my ass off to continue being a full-time artist, I'm either trying to entertain my 1 1/2 yr old son, getting a few waves out front or shoveling food in my face. And there's always home maintenance. Plenty of that to go around. We just got a hot tub so I expect to dedicate some serious hours drinking whiskey in that thing to get my money's worth.
3. You’re Dad is a legendary fly fisherman and fly reel inventor. He also has a great personality. Can you share a favorite quote or life advice your Dad has given you?
Yes, my dad is pretty classic. I was just telling him the other day how I remember driving down the road in his brown Suburban, I was probably 10 or 11 years old, and the Rolling Stones came on the radio and he started jabbing my chest with his finger and singing at the top of his lungs "You can't always get what you waa-ant... you can't always get what you waa-aant... But if you try sometimes, you might find, you get what you neee-eeed!" That stuck with me. And I guess I have all I need right now, because I try pretty damn hard, but definitely don't have all that I want. I try to be grateful but can't help feeling hungry for more. 'Merica.
4. Where did the inspiration for the Wide Wise come from?
The inspiration came from an Owl illustration I did and the Signal crew thought it would make a rad snowboard graphic. So I modified it a bit and played around with some different color-ways and there you have it. I've really been digging painting animals lately. It's nice to mix it up and veer away from the surf/ocean stuff and venture off somewhere new.
5. Will you sneak some snowboarding in this season? If so, where would you like to go?
There's been talk of a short Mt. Bachelor trip in Feb. But I haven't been on a board in a few seasons. Mostly because I got lazy and it's easier to just go surf where I live. But lately I have been craving some steep, deep tree runs and just doing mach speed hacking powder turns. I'm over the park shit, I tend to hurt myself... all my broken bones have been from snowboarding in the park. I suck.