Check out a recent editorial by Sophie for SurfGirl Magazine delving into the rich history of women’s longboading!

THE LADY AND THE LOG

The irrepressible allure of the incandescent dance of classic longboarding is recently enjoying a resounding revival in both popular culture and participation for women and girls. Sophie Everard reflects upon the once maligned art of longboarding, now a stalwart of women’s surf culture.

Longboarding, a once-derided faction of surfing, has seemingly taken up permanent residency on many an Insta-feed. The pairing of retro, sun-dappled vintage-hued tones in stunning photograph and video with the twinkle-toe dances of some of the world’s most famous lady-loggers including Victoria Vergara, Nique Miller and Kassia Meador is driving a marked rise in longboarding’s popularity and participation. Enthusiasts have been popping up and peppering longboarding pockets worldwide, from Biarritz to Byron Bay, Watergate Bay to Sayulita, cementing an enamoured audience’s loyalty to the graceful style that was once a trademark of bygone times.

Where performance longboarding hasn’t perhaps captured imaginations in the same way cross-stepping’s peaceful grace has, classic styles of longboarding have risen to the fore, cemented by the World Surf League’s recent creation and inception of a World Longboard Tour. But longboarding’s mystical spell of allure can in fact be traced to years gone back, to the rebellious Hawaiian Princess Kaiulani. Frequently cited as a key figure of historical significance in surfing lore, Kaiulani defiantly paddled out against the Missionaries who had settled in Hawaii and outlawed surfing during the 1800’s. Princess Kaiulani infamously (and scandalously at the time) refused to abide by the Missionaries ban on surfing, boldly leading her people to the ocean and back to surfing. Fast forward to the Gidget-era of the 1950’s, where the infamous, eponymous character played by Sally Hughes epitomised and immortalised Malibu’s burgeoning Cali-cool longboarding scene, captivating young girls worldwide. Historical moments of cultural significance have debatably fuelled longboarding’s phoenix-like rise, from Princess Kaiulani’s mythical uprising to Gidget hitting the screens, and most recently, surf-brand Seea’s movie-short Sea Us Now which featured women’s surf crew Textured Waves, whose powerful, graceful community of surfers are reaffirming women of colours place in the water.

Indeed, longboarding can too be aligned with critical moments of social impact. 3-time World Longboarding Champion Cori Schumacher’s (the first openly gay world surfing champion) drive for positive social change around gender disparity and homophobia greatly opened up social and cultural discussion through the sport, paving the way for athletes such as Keala Kennelly, and a more diverse audience to longboarding. Furthermore, the laid-back community of old-school longboarders can arguably be found to be more welcoming to the tentative hang-tenner, attracting a more diverse and calmer crowd than its competitive, athletic-driven shortboarding counterparts. Testosterone-fuelled irritations and ire are perhaps less likely to pop-up on lazy, woozy, waist-high days where sharing waves and endless smiles are by the large the order of the day. The ease of riding a longer board, paddling and standing up, means it enables more to surf, finding broad appeal with those who are put-off by the difficulty of surfing shorter boards. Shortboarding’s implosion into the mainstream in the late 80s fuelled an enormous rise in popularity, the classic golden age of the surf industry arguably peaking in the 90’s and 2000s, where the World Tour, and demi-god hero’s like Kelly Slater fired short-boarding’s mass appeal. The metamorphosis of the industry has opened up to more sub-cultures of surf, and the ancient art of longboarding, once more is captivating imaginations worldwide. Women’s longboarding is an art form praised by both sexes alike, the graceful style of female longboarders driving women’s surfing further forwards, and hearteningly welcoming an abundance of female surfers of varying race, background and sexuality. Running hand in hand with the intoxicating, beatniq-esque freedom of roundtripping captured so artfully on social media posts, longboarding’s lore has long been synonymous with a sense of escapism, wanderlust and freedom. With many of us so craving that peaceful sense of joy and play, longboarding is the perfect outlet. Here’s to spotting many more girls and women dancing through line-ups worldwide.