Delight in design of iconic boards | Noosa News | Local News in Noosa

Current Australian Female Longboard Champion Rosie Locke with a few classic surfboards that will be on display at the Noosa Festival of Surfing.

PETER GARDINER

Even among a million dollar collection of surfing dreams, there has to be a stand-out star that can turn the head of longboarding gunslingers like Noosa’s Josh Constable.

And the Global Surfing Industries Noosa Festival of Surfing’s Private Collections starting this Sunday has a real smoking gun – something that beat a lot of other surfboard designers to the draw.

And that was the foam sandwich surfboard – using styrofoam core between layers of teak plywood – produced by the Bob Simmons, who had a thing about cutting edge design.

This board has another claim to fame. It was corralled and ridden by the biggest TV star of the day James Arness – the gun-toting, straight-shooting Marshall Matt Dillon of Gunsmoke fame.

“This classic piece of surfing history, last traded for more than $40,000, is one of the centrepieces of Private Collections, presented by SOLID Racks,” the festival website sprukes.

“Arness, a keen surfer, put his newfound wealth to good use, purchasing one of the first foam surfboards produced.

“Some of the boards in this collection have never been seen by the public...others have been glimpsed briefly, as they appeared at auction on behalf of a private estate, and were snapped up by another private estate.”

The exhibition opens 10am-6pm at Surf City in Noosa Lions Park from Sunday to Friday, March 19. It also contains such classics as: a Tom Blake hollow paddleboard, 1930, Hawaiian hot curl, 1940s, Bob Simmons foam sandwich, 1940s, Dale Velzy prototype pig, 1950, Gidget films prop board, 1959, Gordon Woods balsa pig, 1959, Bob McTavish Keyo Plastic Machine, 1967, George Greenough Hayden spoon, 1969 and Tinkler tail Wayne Lynch flexi-tail, 1976.

Josh, a four-times Noosa Pro winner and runner-up at last year’s Festival of Surfing presented by Golden Breed, said he loved all these old boards.

“But I don’t really have a dream board – my dream board is one that will win be another world title,” Josh said, giving some true classics a serious eye-balling this week.

Surf City will be drool central for those serious about surfing history and classic lines.

Organisers said among the big names of surfboard design at the festival are California pioneer shapers Bing Copeland, Mike Hynson and Mickey Munoz, Australian pioneers Bill Wallace, Gordon Woods and Joe Larkin.

And throw in shortboard revolutionaries Bob McTavish and Dick Brewer, and 1970s and ’80s design icons Simon Anderson and Mark Richards and you have some seriously radical-thinkers.

All are ready to reveal secrets at the design forum, 6pm-8pm on Wednesday, March 17.

Festival director Phil Jarratt said that school groups would be invited to tour the Private Collections exhibition during festival week.