Connecticut | Quartersnacks

Connecticut Report — Be Easy’s ‘Decade’ Video

Video & Remixes February 7th, 2023 · 12:00 pm · 2

There is always an endearing quality to skate crews that stick together into adulthood — navigating work, family, and all the hurdles life throws in the way of linking up to watch your friend try a wallride behind a dumpster on a Saturday morning in December.

Decade is the third video from the Be Easy crew out of Sherman, Connecticut (about an hour and 45 minute drive from New York for our friends from foreign lands), concocted while the crew was reminiscing over old tapes from the VX days. The video was filmed over the past six months and dispersed with MiniDV memories celebrating a decade since their earliest projects filmed as a collective.

We’ve talked about it on here before, but it almost feels like your average New York-based crew is more likely to drive two hours to Philly for a day trip than just over the Westchester border to skate Connecticut. Videos like Decade (or 2021 favorite “Your Big Cheesecake“) do a great job of showcasing the vibrant homegrown scenes that exist in those smaller cities — places that have historically produced skaters as wide-ranging as Alexis Sablone to Brian Anderson to Jim Greco. Shout out to Alexis and Trevor Thompson’s new shop, Plush, in New Haven, where Decade premiered, too. (Somehow the first CT shop to carry QS goods!)

The WKND Dudes in Connecticut + Albany

Daily News July 21st, 2021 · 3:08 pm · 2

Ollie in front of Supreme by Max Wheeler. No, a different Supreme. Photo by Bobby Murphy.

The scope of skateboard travel got way smaller this past year-and-a-half. Connecticut — that lil’ big state that is basically just outside The Bronx — posed an interesting case study. Following the thaw-out from the most depressing winter of our lifetimes, our first trip out of New York was to CT. We came armed with inspiration from “Your Big Cheesecake,” a March 2021 Connecticut video that was blurbed about on here in the winter, and originally found on Skate Jawn. In it, you find a vast network of cutty, underseen spots sitting in small cities that are all a shorter drive away than Philadelphia. It wasn’t until just recently that our brains were forced to understand that maybe there was some skateboard escape nearby that wasn’t one we have been to dozens of times before. The rewatchability of “Your Big Cheesecake” definitely helped hammer that point home.

Where In The World Is Tommy Cuilan?

Daily News March 15th, 2021 · 12:00 am · 7

Huf on West Broadway (the summer before 9/11) by Gerhard Stochl, via Science Versus Life.

A video profile of Jahmal Williams for Juxtapoz magazine.

There are tried-and-true tales of crust synonymous with New Jersey, Philly, Ohio and the greater midwest — but for some reason, as the eastern seaboard begins transitioning into seafood shacks and Ivy League schools, a lot of that narrative gets lost, despite the fact that spots in places like Connecticut are every bit as rugged as those of its crustaceous neighbors. “Your Big Cheesecake” is a 14-minute video out of Connecticut by Dave Sullivan that is well-worth your time, and full of spots that you haven’t grown tired of seeing ♥ It really ramps up a few octaves at the end …that nollie at Trinity in particular, wow.

Love Your Boys

Daily News September 5th, 2017 · 4:55 am · 4

Please donate whatever you can spare to P-Stone’s Memorial Fund.

Manuel Schenck has a new all-Parisian edit for Supreme to commemorate their upcoming Nike SB Air Force 2. Features Nik Stain (!!!), Vince, Sage, Sean, K.B., Kyron Davis and Koston returning to gap skating at my favorite spot in the world.

The battle of the century. See everyone in Montreal this weekend?

Café Creme has a new interview with my favorite Wilson brother. It’s weird how QS has ran interviews for my second favorite Wilson, in addition to my third favorite Wilson brother, but we never got around to #1.

New Era has a lifestyle-ish clip with Tyshawn Jones pushing around Soho and Tribeca. You likely already caught it, but the Hardies Australia clip featuring T.J, Troy, K.B, Chopped Cheese, etc. is a good time as well.

“But even in his most powerful Diamond t-shirt, Chaz Ortiz can’t carry 2.7 million souls on his back alone.” Boil the Ocean reviews Realm, the latest video from Chicago’s Deep Dish crew, which came out last month.

Tennyson Corporation put together every appearance Rick Howard and Mike Carroll ever had in an issue of 411 to a four-song mega mix.

C.J. Keossaian, Sean Dahlberg, Hugo Boserup, Andrew Wilson, Nik Stain and John Choi traveled to the Westerly and Groton skateparks in Connecticut, and came back with “Jet Fueled Hog.” We did that once. Good times.

Frontside 5050 to nosemanual is maybe the last trick anyone expected to see on Pyramid Ledges from that period where the one side was unknobbed.

Heaps Chat interviewed A.V.E. about his favorite restaurants and least favorite streets.

Amazing they even got to ten — Village Psychic re: the ten best backside feebles on ledges. We’re particularly offended Torey’s Baby Steps ender got left out, but Canadian skate gods are used to being neglected by the #fakenews media by now.

Mark Wetzel’s Static IV part is now online. (Also an experimental 5050 guy.)

Assuming everyone already caught the 13-minute Hotel Blue promo that was on Thrasher by now? Nick also uploaded a quick bit of new Powers footage on IG.

Mac Kelly’s Terminally Chill 3 was a fun watch.

A talent for fakie hardflips and a song from a rapper who never had his music used in a skate video before, via Jeremy Murray’s 1/2 D.C. 1/2 New York Good Grief part.

Quote of the Week: “There’s nothing worse than having to explain a t-shirt to someone.” — Pryce Holmes

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The QS Transition Facilities Tour — Part 1

Features & Interviews November 24th, 2015 · 9:46 am · 5

Photo by Zach Baker

It is no secret that we spend an inordinate amount of time in caged in, flat spaces. And it is no secret — as much as we may try to glamorize it — that it gets old after a while. With open road season in the northeast coming to a close, we hit I-95 one last time this fall. Except rather than going to surefire crutches like Eggs or Pulaski, we aimed for something a little different, and a little less…flat. We loaded up the three or five people in the crew adequately versed in skating transition for an atypical QS journey. We went to concrete skateparks, and ended up leaving something permanent behind us in the end (more on that later.)

The concrete skatepark is a relatively new phenomenon in New York. Sure, Owl’s Head has been there for a decade-and-a-half, but the recent surge in parks popping up everywhere is only ~five years old. It also came after we spent much of the 2000s languishing in pre-fab purgatory. Even then, if you heard some of the stories from people tasked with negotiating the skaters’ side in building a park, you’d want to strangle yourself with the red tape. We have one of the three largest city economies in the world; the level of bureaucracy that comes with each one we’re fortunate enough to have is unparalleled. Hopefully, the stadium-lit volleyball courts out on Tribeca piers have an easier time getting built…

Filmed by Johnny Wilson & Max Palmer. Alternate YouTube link.

New England embraced outdoor and public concrete parks long before we did. That’s mostly due to two people: Sloppy Sam, who founded Breaking Ground Skateparks, and Jeff Paprocki, who now owns Paprocki Concrete & Masonry. Both of them navigated the laws and public works departments that vary between every New England town to create much of the vast network of parks that exists up there today. Once you stop by Frank Pepe’s in New Haven and make it into the eastern half of Connecticut, it’s possible to spend the day hitting three or four unique parks, all thanks to these dudes. They aren’t “D.I.Y.” creations in the grey understanding that we have of that phrase, but it’s obvious they wouldn’t exist without the saintly proactive efforts of a few individuals. “It’s all about knowing the right person to talk to.” And also having the right crew around you.