In a small shed built from stones, nestled amongst the rich rolling green farmlands over-looking rural Ireland’s Emerald Coast, there is a quaint shaping bay that Ryan Lovelace has set up shop in for the next week to craft a few boards for a small crew of experimental locals.
I am not sure where I picked up the term the Emerald Coast, but apparently it is non-existent. However, the sea here is perfectly transparent; rich, green and unpolluted, so the name will stay. Long strands of seaweed provide a haven for the abundant oceanic population and shoulder high lumps of glass peel effortlessly across the fossil filled limestone points. As a result of these recent warm days and misty mornings, the grass in this rural area is extraordinarily vibrant. It won’t be long until the sea fog settles in and heavy clouds will establish residency, turning the greens to bronze and the landscape into painterly tones of different metals. But right now, the weather is treated like treasure. No one dares speak too loudly of their luck for the fear of losing it for another year.
To the east lay the Ox Mountains. To the west, the lush farmlands roll gently towards the Atlantic until they unsuspectingly roll over cliffs that have played a part in many a sheep’s demise. If you were to sail directly north over the Atlantic, you would not be stopped until you ran into and iceberg or Iceland. I found Ryan sleepily lying in between some rocks watching the long lines of swell lazily wrap into the bay. “Man, you’re going to trip when you see where we are staying!” he told me.
For Ryan, it is the last week of the European leg of his everlasting Shapetastic Voyage. As a result of a few curious emails, he had been taken to paradise.
This whole trip is the result of a local Architect named Spike. Spike is addicted to sliding along the endless variety of points that frequent his area on any kind of device that will draw clean, fast lines. His interest in and experiments with displacement hulls is the main reason. After stumbling upon an article about one of Ryan’s V-bowls, Spike set out to find one in Europe. Having no such luck, he sent an email to Ryan directly, and a few months later, Ryan wrote back telling him that he would be coming to Europe for a few months to shape some boards and it would be possible to put an order, but Spike had a better idea.
This is Spike. “Man,” Ryan said. “Spike is a really special dude.”
“Why don’t you come to Ireland and shape it here?” he asked. “I have a small shaping bay and we have lots of waves.”
That was enough for Ryan to extend his trip and buy a ticket from France to Ireland. Spike mentioned this to a few friends and they wanted a board, too. An agreement of six boards was reached, so Spike organized the materials, an amazing house to sleep in, then made sure he had enough time off from work to take Ryan surfing every day and help him out in the workshop.
One of the quirks with Ryan’s work as a traveling shaper is the inconsistencies in the spaces he works in. Spike had taught himself to shape over the years, making around forty boards for himself and as gifts for his close circle of friends. But without ever working in a real factory, his setup was not what Ryan had been used to working in, so the first morning was spent tuning the space, reconstructing the racks and building glassing stands.
To see more photos from this story, head over to The Whale Bones Project, where this story was originally published.
