Hills Skates in Muswell Hill were a long time advertiser in R.a.D. but I can’t remember a great deal about them. The Bauer Turbo Roller skate which features so prominently here encourages my notion that their background was in eight wheels, not four.
I’ve just noticed one point of interest here:
Mapled Blank Deck with Concave, Blue Stained and Varnished 30″ x 10″ £14.95
Blanks in 1988? That would have been a very early example of a phenomenon which I normally think of as coming along later.
Or have I got that wrong?
Jonathan responded on 22 Nov 2009 at 1:02 pm #
Hills were a bike shop predominantly, but they also sold skateboards and rollerskates. I remember buying my first deck there, a Santa Cruz Rob Roskopp mini.
I’m fairly sure they sold blanks too.
Teo Surman responded on 08 Dec 2009 at 8:39 am #
Do you remember the earliest blanks were large rough cut rectangles with truckbolt holes and concave/tails. The idea was to get your blank half the price of another pro deck and get the guy at the shop to draw round your favourite shaped board then take it home and get the jig saw out! These were called ‘cut yer own ‘ decks and they always had them at Southsea skatepark’s shop but John Thurston would do the cutting for you for free!