Just like the eye-catching blue ground at the globe, it was hard to remember where I first noticed Marcello Campanello’s skating. His movements tempt me to use descriptors often left to non-skateboarding journalists: whirling, spinning, twisting, leaping. I noticed him in local projects, namely: Canal videos, and then saw him popping up in Diego Donival’s project Goodily. With the help of Instagram, I knew he was an Astoria Park staple, but I didn’t know much else. It wasn’t surprising, though, when he surfaced on Karl Watson’s Maxallure board brand. Now, designing graphics for Maxallure and with a stockpile of clips, is as good a time as any to find out more.
2020 — the year that we hold responsible for many of our present woes — didn’t even start that bad.
They fixed the ground at the ledges across from Columbus Park! Seemingly out of nowhere! Here was a spot that we had only vicariously experienced in old videos, passed by zillions of times thinking, “Man, if only the ground wasn’t shit,” and maybe forced a session on every half-decade. And it was renovated!
Two ledges! With ends! A block from the hellish Bermuda-esque Triangle formed by Family Court x Blubba x Courthouse at that!
2021 began with a similar moment of spot serendipity. The Money Longer alien who took over the lease of the Men in Black towers in 2016 descended and flattened out the second, less iconic fountain at Flushing.
“I went from being a kid skating on my block to hanging out with all the best skaters in New York City because I learned how to do a frontside 360 boneless.” A friend once had a story about how their book club took a razor to The Powerbroker and sliced it up into three books to make it more reasonable of a read. This isn’t that dramatic, but a blog interview that takes over two hours to read is a lot for most people in the era of byte-sized #content — but we’re *SO* happy that people are putting detailed, rich content on the internet that requires a commitment! Isn’t that what it’s for?! The Slam City Skates blog’s interview with Eli Gesner about skateboarding + graffiti in New York in the 80s, night clubs in the early 90s, the beginnings of Shut + Zoo York, etc. is like a little history book :)
Given the QS office’s loveaffair with the city of Copenhagen, we decided to link up with our friends at Street Machine to promote the romance in skateboarding ♥ Quartersnacks for Street Machine ♥ will be available this Friday, July 21 at Street Machine (duhhh), Civilist, Slam City Skates, Arrow & Beast, Ben-G, Lockwood and Labor. Also available on the QS webstore at midnight on Friday, E.S.T.
Rest in Peace, Cup and Saucer, which will serve its last bacon, egg and cheese today. Thank you for giving us a comfortable place to eat breakfast in the winter while everyone else is late to meet up. You will be missed.
Nobody skated the Banks in the years leading up to them closing, because like, they sucked. Seven years passed. People got really good at skateboarding. And now everyone skates at theBanks again ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Andrew Skateshop continues to push new wave Miami skateboarding with their new promo, “Loso,” which includes a full part with Carlos Mendoza from Drama.
LurkNYC posted eight minutes of raw John Shanahan footage. Does anyone remember which part he skates off the rock and over the wooden bench a few hundred feet south of Three Up Three Down? Can’t find the footage.
With tensions between the U.S. and Russia running high these days, let’s lighten the mood with some links from behind the former Iron Curtain! 1 — Hungary) Eastern Europe’s Most Productive Crew, the Rios boys, come through with a new one entitled “Visít.” 2 — Abkhazia) The guys at Absurd Skateboards have an uncanny ability at skating spots that look like they’re locations from a creepy horror movie. Their trip to the partially-recognized nation of Abkhazia is no different, although the mood lightens after the first song. 3 — Mother Russia herself)What Youth has a video essay / interview with Tolia Titaev about the Russian skate scene.
