The success and history of Byrne Surfboards revolved around the close knit Byrne brothers. Phil, Dave, and Chris were highly successful surfers growing up in Australia and competitive surfing took them to the top surf spots in the world including Bali, Indonesia and the surf mecca of Hawaii.

Byrne Surfboards got its start at a time when professional surfing began to emerge. Dave Byrne had been working as a glasser while Phil had been shaping in Australia and Hawaii. Thus, the three brothers decided to start their own label and their surfing experiences in Hawaii influenced their surfboard designs and methods.

Their success in creating high performance boards attracted the attention of some of the top surfers in the world at the time including Shaun Tompson and Larry Bertlemann. … Read More »

“Formed in Australia in 1976, the Bronzed Aussies were surfing’s first commercial ambassadors in the predawn era of professionalism. The brainchild of Sydney Daily Mirror journalist Mike Hurst and three of Oz’s top pros at the time, Mark Warren, Ian “Kanga” Cairns and pink fetishist Peter Townend (nee “PT”), the group took their name from an old adage for sun-baked beach boys and their inspiration from the ’60s cadre of Aussie tennis players — Rod Laver, Roy Emerson, John Newcombe — who’d barnstormed that sport, raising both the financial stakes and media awareness tenfold in the process…

“Very much the forerunner of today’s surf teams (i.e. Team Quiksilver), the media savvy BAs trademarked their Aussie wave logo and plastered it on everything they rode and wore — boards, trunks, sleek jumpers, … Read More »

With surfing, as with most things in life, style is everything. William Stuart Hamilton was born in Long Beach, California. Seeing the world in a Bud Browne movie sold him on the surfing life. He was determined to become one of the best. In 1966, he returned to Hawaii, fresh from high school and already acknowledged as one of the most popular surfers around (landing sixth in the Surfer Poll). He had begun shaping under the tutelage of Surfboards Hawaii’s John Price in 1967, but turned to commercial fishing on Kauai for more income. He would continue shaping, finding work with Country Surfboards, Chuck Dent and Lightning Bolt and he stepped up his shaping under the Billy Hamilton label ever since the ’90s longboard revival. Stepson Laird has established himself as the sport’s premier big-wave rider, leading the tow-in revolution … Read More »

There are few aspects of surf culture that Ben Aipa hasn’t touched. At the peak of his physical talents during the 1960s and 1970s, Aipa was a ferocious competitor and powerful free surf presence in every lineup he entered. Then, after establishing Aipa Surfboards in 1970, the Honolulu native also became one of the most innovative board designers in history. He is credited with the invention of both the swallowtail and stinger design variations, a series of tail-rail-fin breakthroughs that helped feed the dynamic performances of rising stars like Michael Ho, Larry Bertlemann, Buttons Kaluhiokalani, and Mark Liddell. In the wake of these innovations, Aipa quickly established a reputation as a go-to shaper for boards that could enhance the low-slung and aggressive style that soon became the vanguard of performance during that era. Afterward, … Read More »