The Blank Pages
ZAK Surfboards
by Zak Koniaris
The Surfboard Studio Have you ever wanted to make your own surfboard? The Surfboard Studio offers world-class instruction and tuition in surfboard shaping, design, glassing and sanding, all based conveniently in Melbourne and affiliated with a stalwart of Melbourne surf culture, Zak Surfboards. The aim is to teach not only the art of surfboard shaping but to share the handcrafted skills as well the computer CAD / CNC machining and knowledge of how surfboard designs work in all sorts of waves. As a student of the Surfboard Studio, you will be both the customer and the shaper. Going through the custom order you will discover how to get the right dimensions and style of board to suit the waves you want to surf. Your surfboard will be shaped in a methodical way with a proven formula. Any small mistakes that may occur through the process can be easily corrected, so your board, although shaped entirely by yourself, will be of a high quality and you will be extremely pleased with the result in our state-of-the-art Melbourne factory.
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The Surfboard Studio is also your one-stop shop for all your shaping and glassing needs. Either shop online or drop in to pick up blanks, cloth, resin and everything else you might need or come in and see the Zak Surfboards crew at their Thornbury store for any help you might need with retail gear.
Learn to shape your own surfboard, taught by board builders with over 50 years of collective surfboard making experience. Meet the crew.
Zak shaped his first surfboard at 13 in a lean-to down the side of his parent’s house in Viewbank, and offered surfboard repairs to mates and local surf shops during his teenage years. He would catch a bus all the way to Trigger Bros to pick up blanks and resin and remembers being told there wasn’t a cent to be made in shaping surfboards. Indicatively, Zak kept shaping and repairing boards. His first store packed 86 surfboards, a wall of accessories, a bunch of skateboards and wetsuits into a 6×3 metre shop. Zak Surfboards now located at 307 Victoria Road, Thornbury stocks over 1000 surfboards offering customers the best of the best Victorian shapers as well as boards from leading shapers around the world. “We passionately support local shapers,” says Zak. “We’re proud to provide a hub for quality Victorianproduced surfboards, shaped for Victorian surf conditions. Boards from guys like Maurice Cole, Greg Brown, Rousa, Simon Forward, Ken Reimers, Vanda, Michael Anthony, Jordan Noble, Sean Nettleton and Darren Dickson. We’ve also sought out boards from the likes of Eric Arakawa, Jeff Bushman, John Pyzel and Matt ‘Mayhem’ Biolos to give our customers a choice of the best from Australia and internationally. The Surfboard Studio sees Zak returning to his first love – making surfboards.
SMORGASBOARDER | SPRING 2016 | BOARD BUILDERS BUSINESS PROMOTION
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7/10/2016 1:13 AM