Check out these mid 80’s skate deck at the Westbeach shop – bright colours were in, shapes were changing, this was skateboarding’s second coming. Snowboarding would be next.

Graphics were ever everything and still are

Skateboarding’s popularity was suffering in the early 80’s and fashion was changing, surf culture was in, while the snurfer and snowboarding were on the rise. Bright colours and Californian culture were being imported in Canada and the California dream was alive and kicking.

Yes, the ad below does say, “DIG THIS BUYERS”. I think I still do.

-Jon Cartwright

This framed advertisement comes from Chip’s personal archive of Westbeach memories. It was probably the first ad that Westbeach did and from what I can tell it ran in a trade magazine in the early 80’s. It is also one of the few pieces of advertising that Chip kept. His archive also contained some amazing examples of the early snow clothing and lots of internal comunications.

Some of the things that I find interesting about this ad is the cut and paste that is a holdover of the recent punk movement, the lack of name identification, The shorts are called “chips shorts”, as well as “2 HIP” just within this ad. Chip has also called them “bbq shorts” and of course they ended up being Westbeach shorts. The name “Westbeach” is relegated to the tiny yellow strip on the bottom right (mostly hidden beneath the frame). The brand was definitely tying to find its name still at this point.

Also, the “surfer” in the top photo, on the left, is Shane Bunting who later went on to fame as “Madchild” from  the Canadian hiphop crew “Swollen Members”

- Dano

Westbeach began 30 years ago before snowboarding existed as we now know it. “Streetwear” and “lifestyle” were new ideas imported from California’s surf and skate scene. Chip Wilson’s Westbeach Calgary shop (pictured here) was the spot to get your latest trends, get some original California brands, and know there was more out there than 501’s and button ups. No snowboard sold here yet – it was all about the short!

By the mid 80’s Westbeach was making a good volume of T’s and hoodies in addition to its shorts. The “Streetwear” industry was booming. Check out Westbeach overseas production!

PS – Yes – the woman is drying the screen with a hair dryer.

Westbeach grew out of Canada’s fascination with California and everything it represented. If Chip had decided to sell shorts with an Eastern European theme we wouldn’t be talking today.

Here are some things from the archives. First is the article clipped out of the Calgary Herald from Chip’s personal stash from about 1983 or 84.

And finally an old sticker. The sticker is significant because it is a snapshot of the moment in time when Cal B.C. became Westbeach. It’s cool to see the single surfer logo that preceded the “three surfers” that everyone knows. Also, Westbeach was never really known for its involvement in skating despite having sold the product for yeras so it’s cool to see “Westbeach Skate Lounge”.

Finally, here is an excerpt from the book that talks about some of those times. Enjoy.

As the kids started to pick up on snowboarding, the retailers inevitably followed. Even if at first they were a little skeptical about the new sport. Scott Sibley remembers his first impressions of snowboarding:

“It was so good for us because all the young guys coming into the store going, ‘Oh, have you heard of snowboarding?’ you know bringing input to us and we’re going, ‘Oh really!’ There was a kid called Kelly Alm and he was just on us like crazy about this new thing called snowboarding and he brought this in it was the Burton with the medical hose bindings and all of this stuff and he goes, “Check this out!”  and you look at it and you go, ‘Are you serious?’  But, you know that was my first discussion about snowboarding.   And it comes through a kid.”

Of course once they started to carry boards, things really started to pick up steam. I asked Paul Culling about discovering snowboarding and the role that the shops played in the growing sport:

“I went to Cal BC which was a little pink house (on 4th Avenue in Vancouver), it was a Californian inspired clothing store, and then downstairs in the basement there was a skate shop and so we used to go over there and then it was probably just a matter of hearing that there was a shop in Vancouver that sold some kind of snowboard.  There was that, there was PD and…when you were a kid and you were skateboarding you would take the bus clear across to – I mean it – two hours to go to a skate shop, not even if you had any money, just to stare at the new decks on the wall, right.  And that’s the kind of feeling of this passion that you have and you want to go in and you want to talk to somebody else.  Back then if you were to see somebody else on a snowboard, anybody to do with snowboarding and you would immediately just talk because you want to share experiences.  ‘Where have you gone?  What have you done?  What are you riding?’  because it was all so new.  I mean everything was new.”

In 1987 Cal BC officially became the Westbeach Surf Company and the store moved out of the little pink house and into the spot that would become the center of the Westbeach brand for more than 20 years, at 1723 West 4th Ave.

- An exerpt from the upcoming “Out West:Snowboarding, Westbeach and a new Canadian Drea,” to be released fall 2009.