History of Roarockit EU

As you may have heard, the Roarockit Skateboard Company has expanded into the European market with a brand new home base in France. In charge of the new operation is Sarah Jackson and Nicolas Alix, two incredible young entrepreneurs who had a vision and brought it to life.

Click on photo to see the pyrography process on this custom board by Champstiles Woodburning

Earlier this year, both Sarah and Nico visited the Roarockit HQ in Toronto for an extended training period. Being the person who primarily trained them, I can tell you first hand that we made them work super hard in preparation of opening their own branch of Roarockit. Not only did they learn all the basics of manufacturing, shipping/receiving and customer service in the skateboard industry, but they also helped teach us a few new tricks as well!

Presenting Sarah & Nico with the custom burned deck chronicling their trip to Roarockit Toronto

Background:

Nicolas (Nico) has a baccalaureate in management and accounting and is qualified as a stone mason, specializing in restoring historical monuments. Following school, he became fully involved in the motocross world and worked alongside his best friend for many years teaching motocross to young children. After several years of this, he left it all to go travelling around the world. During his journeys Nico improved his English, on top of his French, and has now returned home to launch Roarockit Skateboard Europe. 

Marcel and Nico making shirts for the 6th Annual Swap Meet

After completing her European baccalaureate (specializing in German) Sarah graduated with a degree in Linguistics from UCL (London, UK) all before she was 21. Following this she worked at various part time jobs, in order to put money aside for travelling expenses. She also spent time volunteering at music festivals as part of the admin team and a translator (French/English/German) between the artists and the organizers. Before training at the Roarockit HQ in early 2013, Sarah had spent time helping out with Roarockit in the early days of the business on a family trip to Toronto. Now that things have come full circle, she is excited to get started running the new European division of the company. 

Sarah & Nico making their first custom drop deck

The finished product - A handmade, bottle shaped 1" drop deck!

On the next Rockit Talk, we interview Sarah and Nico to hear a bit more about their new business (ad)venture, skateboarding in France and the future for Roarockit Skateboard Europe!  

Board N' School.. SUCCESS

This past weekend - April 19-21, 2013 - saw the opening of the Oasis Skateboard Factory (OSF) and Roarockit Skateboard Companies first ever skateboard art auction!  The event helped launch Roarockit's new Lil' Rockit builder kit, and raised money for the school by having some of Toronto's finest artists do graphics on 19 hand built boards.

In preparation of the show, each student paired up with a different artist and taught them how to build their own board using the Thin Air Press vacuum bag system.  After working on the construction, each pair designed an image that incorporated the "Board N' School" theme to apply to the bottom of the deck. Artist's then took their boards home and brought the vision to life!

Left: John Marriott pours the glue - Right: Zanette Singh goes over board designs

Artist and Student Collaborated Board Designs

Friday, April 19th - the grand opening party at the Gladstone Hotel's Art Bar. The Roarockit crew arrived early that morning and worked with the OSF students to help set up the show, which included a giant 'Handmade with Roarockit Technology' sign that the kids had made earlier that week in class. 

ROCK's OSF Mural Club use math to create the 'Roarockit Technology' sign

Lauren puts the finishing touches on the chalkboard displays.

Craig Morrison addresses the troops before the start of the show.

The night was filled with great vibes, familiar faces and an overwhelming sense of pride that could be felt from the students as they talked about their innovative program, all whilst keeping a watchful eye on their board's rising bids... they even brought out some of their signature 'Hooky' boards to shred around the gallery!

Everyone had a great time at the opening, and almost all of the boards were bid on and won by some very generous and stoked individuals! We would like to thank everyone who came out to support the Oasis program and helped show these students what can be achieved with some hard work and planning.

Also, a BIG shout out goes to the Gladstone Hotel, all the artists involved, Lauren and Craig from the OSF...and whoever brought that cake that was chillin in the back! 

Everyone here at Roarockit also deserves a bit of a pat on the back as well ;)

Check out our Facebook page for more photos of the event and the work leading up to it as well.

Board N' School Art Auction

The Oasis Skateboard Factory & Roarockit Skateboard Company Present: Board n' School - A Skateboard Art Show and Auction

Click on photo for the Facebook event page

Where: The Gladstone Hotel Art Bar 

1214 Queen St W - Toronto, ON

View Larger Map

When: Opening reception and silent auction Friday, April 19 7:00-9:00pm 

Exhibit April 19-21 

Friday April 19th sees the Gladstone host a retro mini-skateboard silent auction of rolling artworks by local artists in support of the Oasis Skateboard Factory (OSF), the world's only skateboard and street art design themed high school program. 

A variety of high- profile Toronto artists have partnered with OSF students to create original school-themed works of art on hand-crafted skateboards, and to celebrate the launch of Roarockit’s brand new “Lil' Rockit” skateboard kit, which Roarockit has generously donated for this event. These skateboard art collaborations will be displayed in the Art Bar at the Gladstone Hotel, a community-minded arts hub where design, art and activism intersect, from Friday April 19th through Sunday April 21st, 2013.

Students had the opportunity to teach high profile Toronto artists how to build skateboards by hand. In turn, students then got to collaborate with their artist mentor on a graphic for the board. Typically, OSF students are teenagers who have struggled to connect with high school but through our program focus on creative and entrepreneurial learning with ‘real world’ results they have seen incredible success. Local artist mentorships of students built on that success, exposing students to adult role models who work in the arts while giving them an opportunity to show off their final project in a legitimate gallery. All proceeds of the auction go towards expanding OSF’s innovative program of creative project- based learning and social enterprise. 

Mentoring artists include:

- Fiona Smyth

- Alex Currie (aka Runt)

- John Mariott

- Zanette Singh

- MonsterMeans Mark Byk

- Jimmy Chiale

- Christina Zeidler 

- Laura Wills

- ROCK

- Javid JAH

- Trevor Wheatley 

- Troy Pynn

- Lindsay Fisher

- Sue Cohen 

- Giles Monette

- SLURG

- Hamish from Picnicskate

- Zen Rankin

- Champstiles Woodburning

Opening reception and silent auction Friday, April 19 7:00-9:00pm 

Exhibit runs April 19-21

Lisa Farrows Art

The Roarockit Skateboard Company loves showing off the work done by people in our community, and one of the brightest stars around is Ms. Lisa Farrows!

Lisa is an Outdoor Educator for the Peel District School Board and works with an expulsion program called Fresh Start two days a week. As both a passionate painter and longboarder, she has managed to incorporate both hobbies into her lesson planning and gets students to paint deck-shaped canvases in the classroom... very cool!

You may also recognize Lisa from the Ministry of Wood - as the first artist to be featured in our Builder of the Month section a few years ago. She does some incredible custom paint jobs on boards, often for events or fundraisers, and has even started restoring some historical pieces from around the city:

“...most recently I've been doing restoration work at the Flatiron Building and the Dineen building at Yonge and Temperance. It's been incredible to put my mark on two historical buildings in Toronto. Both buildings have 6 vault doors that are over 100 years old that I've done replication work on. At the Denine building there was a 150 year old safe that was found in an elevator shaft that I brought back to life ... Next on the list is a furnace door and an elevator. It's so exciting.”

Lisa has also worked closely with Rob from Bombora Boards to create some very special decks that were donated to the Boarders Against Breast Cancer fundraiser, and the annual Hospital For Sick Kids Gala.  

And what does the future have in store for Ms. Farrows?

"Who freakin knows! I'm sure there will be more Art, Adventure and Good times..."

You can check out more of Lisa's art on her Facebook page @ https://www.facebook.com/lisafarrowsart or follow her on Instagram @Farrows

You can also email Lisa for a quote on a custom design - artbylisa@gmail.com