It’s no longer just a boys’ club.
Not only has the $10 billion board-sports market — skateboarding, surfing and snowboarding — in recent years witnessed a rise in its ranks of female athletes, but the growing, even dominating share of the juniors’ category is also revolutionizing the very look of the segment, pushing it into more fashion-minded territory.
In some cases, the board-sports market’s latest incarnation is a merging of a heritage now dubbed California lifestyle (but in reality is lifted from quintessential Hawaiian motifs such as hibiscus flowers) with a chic, urban-informed aesthetic. Many labels, primarily those at the helm of this stylistic overhaul — Ezekiel, Volcom, Hurley, Split and Obey, to name a few — are imbuing their collections and very brand identity with a consciousness cultivated by technology, music and a global viewpoint.
“My team travels extensively, so our primary source of inspiration comes from travel. We just got back from Japan, Australia, Amsterdam,” said Summer Rapp, design director for Volcom Girls. The Costa Mesa, Calif.-based line has long led the rebellion against traditional trends within its market with a punk rock sensibility that introduced skinny suits, neckties emblazoned with screened graphics and wrap dresses worthy of Diane von Furstenberg. “We don’t really search high fashion — we mainly look to see how the local culture is impacting fashion,” Rapp added. One of her favorite sources? The subway stations in places like Tokyo or London.
Ryan Rush, creative director and vice president of design at Ezekiel in Irvine, Calif., is also a voracious student of international streets. On a telephone call from Berlin last week, where he was doing market research and representing Ezekiel at the Bread and Butter show, Rush spoke of the balance he and his design team strike between capturing the brand’s roots with other influences.
“I’ve always looked at what I do as less about a board sports-specific product — although that is still very key to who we are — as much as lifestyle fashion.”
The lanky designer has been a pioneer in dragging the action sports business into more fashion-forward grounds since 1995, when he founded Dawls and its sister offshoot, Drawls. In 2001, he joined Ezekiel and immediately upped the ante there, mocking logo mania in the luxury market and hip-hop culture with Ezekiel’s own repeating initials, and propelling a more adventurous color palette in the action sports market. What’s more, like many of his competitors, pushing the proverbial envelope in juniors’ has impacted the brand’s men’s line.
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Even a line such as Roxy — which updated the surfer girl ideal by moving her from passively hanging on the beach to carving up her own waves — has made “fashion” the m.o. in its overall concept, said Randy Hild, senior vice president of the Quiksilver-owned brand. The arrival of design director Dana Dartez four years ago helped turn the corner for the now $420 million power brand with both wide-ranging diversification, including footwear and accessories, and an aging up of the styling, which has allowed more sophisticated elements to be introduced.
The new Roxy shop at South Coast Plaza Mall in Costa Mesa, Calif., also reflects this shift, with its modernist interior features, including floors of blond wood and blue glass mosaic tiles and fixtures that transcend the typical surf shop. Additionally, the company doubled its photography budget and hired Peggy Sirota, who’s work appears in Banana Republic’s distinct campaign as well as editorials for Vanity Fair and GQ.
“That was a bold move for us,” said Hild. “But we needed this outside source to help shape our identity going forward. That even includes the girls in our shoots, who are now a mix of surf athletes and more fashion-oriented models. It’s a tightrope we walk, because we never want to hear from our core market that we’re losing our focus. But if we’re in Teen Vogue or in a department store, we’re up against more fashion than surf lines.”
Yet surf shops, too, are recognizing the wider tastes of their customers and increasingly carrying premium denim from the likes of Seven or alternative casualwear resources such as Juicy Couture and C & C California.
“In general, the traditional beach surfer girl is more exposed to fashion in general now,” noted Monica Woodside, juniors’ design director for Split, the Santa Ana, Calif.-based line that also has never exclusively identified with the board-sports archetype in its clothing or promotional imagery. Split’s muse for fall is modern-day London bohemian Sienna Miller. With her long blonde hair and allover tan, the future Mrs. Jude Law suggests California beach girl with a more global sensibility.
“Our customer today is wearing designer jeans and shopping more contemporary lines,” observed Woodside. “She has a broader sense of the world and wants to incorporate that in the way she lives and looks.”