the origins of skateboarding

it’s impossible to understand actual skateboarding without architecture. alvar and aino aalto, finnish architects from the modern movement, changed the history of skateboarding and they did it 15 years before skateboarding was even born. their innovative design of the pool in villa mairea in 1938, with organic shapes and curves, would be accidentally the first skate bowl design.

. in late 50’s, more than 15 years later skateboarding showed up for the first time in california, and 40 years later pool skateboarding was born, mostly thanks to these architects. it looked like it was meant to be. in 1976 california suffered from a great drought, and pools became useless architectural artifacts. all these pools were identical to aalto’s pool, and they wouldn’t remain useless for long.

skaters gave a new purpose to aalto’s design, a new use they could have never guessed. cause architecture is unpredictable, and its possible uses unimaginable. it took a lot of years to make any skater dream true: to skate villa mairea pool. it wasn’t till 2014 that transworld skateboarding could make it, closing the circle of this skate·architecture story.

. if you want to know more check out @origins_skateboarding

pic by @justushirvi for @transworldskate, noormarkku, finland, 2014