When We Was Rad:
Skateboard History from UK Vintage Magazine

Category: Issue 67 September 1988


  • Santa Cruz advert featuring Natas Santa Monica Airlines deck

    I’m certainly no expert on vintage skateboard companies, so I’m not quite sure where this fits in, but what we have here is a Santa Cruz advert promoting a Natas Kaupas deck which includes the “Santa Monica Airlines” logo. Perhaps someone can help out with the details of the relationship on that brand to various…


  • Muswell Hills Finest Skateshop

    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…


  • Stussy No 4 T shirt and Schmitt plus Dog Town decks

    Skate Paraphernalia from September 1988: Motobilt and Rannalli trucks, Schmitt Stix Chainsaw and Chris Miller decks, Dog Town Micke Alba deck, a Swatch pouch and a Stussy No 4 T shirt. But my favourite thing here is the custom skate badge from Ian Walker in Doncaster. Meanwhile for everyone interested in vintage skateboard decks, look…


  • Anarchic Adjustment Not an Advert and Clan + Mach Adverts from 1988

    “To Remain Underground and Exclusive is to Resist the Mainstream Therefore This is Not an Anarchic Adjustment Advert” It may seem unfair to place so much emphasis on the Anarchic Adjustment advert here when there are also ads from Glasgow stalwarts, Clan and Mach in Edinburgh, but I saw Nick last month for the first…


  • More Vintage BMX, Nick Philip, Zak Shaw

    Nick Philip at work stickering the ramp with Anarchic Adjustment stickers back in 1988, before taking it to America. Zak Shaw looks on as local offers up a loco Twist from low to high… slithering back in whenever and wherever he wished. He used the whole of the ramp with no holds barred: carving Bone-air,…


  • When Freestyle BMX started to get real: Greg Guillotte and Tim Ruck’s Invert Series

    Everything here looks the same as before when you study the details in that overview picture. But I have a feeling things were beginning to change. Skateboarding was taking off again and BMX was about to undergo another transformation. This was the start of something different. In retrospect, I wish we had found more space…


  • Ride if You Want to How You Want To

    Nick Philip wrote this article of the “First Invert Series Bike Ramp Jam” at Chingford. Something’s Happening, Bro’. It started at Crawley and it’s building up speed. The bike riders of this country are getting clued in. They’ve stopped expecting somebody else to organise their lives and they’ve started doing something for themselves. The Invert…


  • UK Skateboard Shop Adverts 1988 style

    There are some unfamiliar names in here. Which of these is still in existence? Add a comment if you know. Surf Ski, Coventry Gridiron, Nottingham Stamyps Skates, Birmingham Cheshire Skateboard Centre, Northwich Skate Zone, Torquay Mycyles, Malvern TnB, Tiverton Scotby Cycles, Carlisle Round Ocean, Doncaster Tombstone, Bristol There’s also Matchrite, selling their jokes and someone…


  • Justin Ashby Intro — Livingston Skatepark

    Justin Ashby was a key figure in UK skateboarding throughout the period of R.a.d Magazine (and long before and since too, of course). I was really pleased when I turned the page and saw this. Strangely enough I was talking to someone last night about the history of Livingston and explaining how it nearly didn’t…


  • Great video from Graham Taylor

    Just seen a video mashup by Graham Taylor which combines Norman McClaren, Georges Balanchine and skate video from the eighties and ninenties. Part of me feels a bit uncomfortable with the ballet parallel. But I’ve always felt extremely uncomfortable with the ‘skateboarding as stadium sport’ let alone ‘skateboarding in the Olympics’ line. So give me…