♪♪
-We were all, in that point and time together,
"We're gonna do this, it's us against the world."
Not the skateboarding.
♪♪
-I'm the chief executive officer at Grindline Skateparks.
We design and build concrete skateboard parks,
and we give communities a place to skate.
It's important because today's youth are underserved
and need a positive influence in their life.
[ Crowd cheers ]
♪♪
[ Crowd cheers ]
♪♪
At Grindline we've designed and built
about 350 to 375 skate parks
in the city of Seattle.
There's the Seattle Center Skatepark
that we built.
There's Delridge, which we designed and built.
There's Jefferson Skate Park, which we designed.
Design and construction of River City Skatepark,
Judkins Skatepark.
And there's the Ballard Bowl, which we built.
We constructed Roxhill Park in West Seattle,
Crown Hill, a little skate spot. We did that one.
♪♪
Grindline was founded by Mark Hubbard, also known as Monk.
Monk and a group of other guys
just wanted to take matters into their own hands,
so it was a combination of being involved in some DIY projects,
and also enlisting in the trades
and learning how to finish concrete
and place shotcrete, and things like that,
and then eventually incorporating
and forming a legit company.
♪♪
-I learned how to do drainage work.
I learned how to do rebar and structural steel.
I learned how to do shotcrete.
I wasn't, of course -- I wasn't like doing
nozzleman or nothing, but I --
I was in there, in the hole, when we were doing shotcrete,
and I seen the guys plaster it,
and I seen them put on the tiles,
and I put on the pool coping.
And we did decks and we built bowls, you know, 1986.
♪♪
-The West Side Bowl,
and the way that kind of came about,
was Mark and a group of friends
were doing a renegade project under the bridge
at Schmitz Park in West Seattle,
and they got all the way up to being ready to pour concrete,
and the cops showed up and shut 'em down.
-Then the cops came right when we were, you know, of course,
uh, pouring the concrete, and they kicked us all out.
-From what I heard, just kind of out of the blue,
um, there was a man who lived in West Seattle,
and he basically said, you can build the bowl in my backyard.
That's what they did. Dug it all out by hand,
and eventually the homeowner moved to Hawaii
and Mark bought the house,
and then kind of the rest went on from there. [ Chuckles ]
♪♪
-Grindline comes from a zine in Phoenix,
from this artist, Gavin Troy, who made a zine,
you know, skate zine, called Grindline.
So, one day Monk saw the zine and he's like,
talking like he does, and he sees this zine Grindline,
"What's this?" I'm like, "That's my buddy's, you know, skate scene.
He's like, "That's the name of our company --
Grindline. Grindline Skateparks."
[ Whirring sounds ]
When we started Grindline, I was working for Vans,
building skate parks and shopping malls.
You know, I was buddies with Monk,
and he always would tell me about how
we're gonna be building parks and stuff.
And I didn't really believe him because
there was no skate parks being built at the time.
One day I got a call and he's like,
"I got it, I got our first park!"
[ Clicking sounds ]
♪♪
-Orcas Island was the first skate park Grindline did
with an actual contract and in as a corporation --
Grindline Skateparks, Inc.
They did it with the famous ski photographer, Warren Miller,
who spearheaded the project, was the community leader for that.
And the Orcas Skatepark is still one of the greatest skate parks
there is in the modern day skateboarding world,
and people come from all over the world to still skate it.
♪♪
-It never really occurred to us that,
like this was going to be our thing.
It -- It just was just kind of something
that we did to have a place to skate.
You know, we knew, maybe not right away,
but eventually, something this, you know,
skate park thing was gonna blow up
because people were really digging what we were doing.
♪♪
[ Clicking sounds ]
♪♪
-So, Mark was one of a kind, definitely.
He was really driven,
had tons of foresight and vision of what he wanted,
and he was able to manifest it, for sure.
-Mark was mischievous,
a leader, always acted like he knew
what he was doing no matter what...
even when he didn't. [ Chuckles ]
I knew him pretty well.
Like I-I can still remember the last day I saw him.
-In 2018, Mark tragically passed away unexpectedly.
It was definitely a devastating blow to the company.
-All of us never recovered from it
and it just actually, you know,
made us all work harder and just realize,
let's make sure that we're fulfilling Mark's dreams,
'cause he brought us all together.
♪♪
-It's nothing like skating something that you built.
You got to be able to learn how to fail.
If you're afraid to fail, then you'll never try anything.
If you -- people are trying stuff all over the place, so...
They have, uh, these DIY spots and you know,
we're all inspired by each other,
and I'm inspired by people that are inspired.
♪♪
[ Whirring and drilling sounds ]
-Skate park starts with the advocates,
so it takes people needing and wanting a skate park
built in their community.
So that's what -- that's what we start with,
that's who comes to us.
So this is a great little area,
lots of room.
It could spread out,
it could be consolidated, you know,
we could fit a skate -- our skate spot in here.
You know, the skate park's gonna be much quieter
than the pickleball courts, so we're not gonna have to worry about that.
-Yeah. -Um, but, you know,
this is also a great location...
Once we get the design project,
then we move into community input,
where we have public meetings with the community and --
and ask what they want to see in their skate park.
...wanted to do is create a safe space
for teens to be able to recreate, and it's theirs.
No one's telling them what -- how to use it,
how not to use it, and it's theirs.
And that's what -- that's what youth need.
Okay, let's go around the room.
One thing everyone wants to see --
I'm the worst writer.
-Uh, mini ramp.
I think you could probably integrate that
with some 12-inch tall ledge,
something that's, you know, a good size.
[ Indistinct chatter ]
-Is that fully out, like, is that four feet out of the ground?
-Yes, but the way the -- the contours of the site go,
we're up about four feet over there.
-And so I would vote for the more,
more of those transitions and bowls,
um, and so maybe having an area
that has like separate like half-pipe.
-I'm the lead designer at Grindline Skateparks.
I handle everything from the 3-D modeling to the rendering,
all the way down to the construction documents
and the specifications for the project.
I think one thing that stands out the most is this, uh,
corner pocket with the cake stairs.
Usually see it in more of a pool-style bowl.
Best part is when we build them to is,
even spots that are just like that,
that don't really seem like they're much
the guys on the field will turn that into something special.
It's also a really cool project too,
because it was very community-involved.
We went through several different phases
to get this where it is.
This line represents all the pool coping.
This is all steel coping around here.
We know how to build them right.
♪♪
-'Cause every job is a little different,
but you -- you show up,
you put in the drain lines,
and then you, uh, you know, scrape the sod or whatever.
-From there, we get into the more fine grading
and really start to shape the terrain
to look like a skate park.
From there, it's formwork, carpentry...
[ Drill whirring ]
steel fabrication...
[ Grinding sounds ]
placement of rebar,
and then the shotcrete and concrete
placement and finishing.
[ Whirring sounds ]
[ Whooshing sounds ]
-Dig it, set it up, pour it.
Go to the next one.
I'd say we're the leader in
the design build side of things --
being able to create what a community wants
and executing it and being creative in the process
and helping skateboarding evolve.
♪♪
-We constructed the last two versions of
the Seattle Center Skatepark.
The park's located on a former piece of Broad Street
that was abandoned when the tunnel was built.
-I'm Kristin. I'm here at the Seattle Center Skate Plaza,
and I am the executive director of Skate Like a Girl.
I would say working with them over time has been pretty awesome.
So if I saw things that were kind of getting built
that didn't really line up with what the vision was,
I, you know, had the ability to like, call them and work with them,
and we were able to create some change orders to,
like, adjust the heights of obstacles, for instance,
to match up like the vision of what we had for the park.
They're all skaters, they get it,
and they really do listen to the community,
and, um, I feel like have adopted their designs
and things like that over time.
[ Whooshing sounds ]
-Grindline is comprised of skateboarders themselves
out there doing the work in the field,
and that -- that's advantageous, because there's a lot of nuances
in skate park construction where these things
can't be captured on a sheet of paper.
There's these complex radius curves and blends
and things like that, and it really takes a skaters eye
to understand how to blend those features
so that a park skates well.
♪♪
-If you're gonna design skate parks,
you have to know skateboarding.
You have to be a skateboarder to know exactly
what's going to work.
♪♪
I think what makes Grindline stand out
from other skate park companies is our bowls.
-That was our signatures --
put a lot of big bowls in the ground
and have those as testaments to what vertical skateboarding is,
and it's never going anywhere.
-Grindline skate parks are special,
like there's always going to be super smooth --
the transitions are always gonna be really nice.
You know, if they're designing the park,
it's gonna be stuff that's fun to skate.
-Being able to have a skate park with a variety of features
has helped me develop my skill set
to be a more well-rounded skater.
I think that most people would agree in the area.
[ Indistinct chatter ]
-You're going to do a ribbon cutting across here
and, uh, and then John --
John will lead off with a jump into the bowl.
Alright, you guys ready?
Go! Grindline!
[ Crowd chanting ] Grindline! Grindline!
-Two...three!
[ Cheers and applause ]
[ Indistinct chatter ]
♪♪
-You know, skateboarding is like this international community,
and Grindline is honored to be a large part of that community.
I've truly seen like people of all different like, you know,
backgrounds, ages, gender, like races,
things like that, all come together
and participate in a skate space.
And I think that's a beautiful thing.
-Skateboarders are usually kind of outcasts.
We don't really fit in.
So it's really nice to be able to come
to the skate park and meet people.
This is just like a gathering space for everybody.
-I meet a lot of people.
Everybody is so nice in the community.
They're so awesome and just loving.
It's just a whole community, it's a family.
♪♪
-It's a trip to see, like the scene explode.
and when we first came out here, there was, you know,
there's lots of skaters, of course,
but with nothing to skate, they just skate curbs and banks
and whatever they find, and now --
now they got an actual spot with lights
to go to and skate every day,
and the friends, and the scene that they build...
you know, together, it's a good thing to be a part of, of course.
They're there to stay and there's no --
there's no going back from this point.
♪♪
-Yeah, ultimately, Grindline started with Mark's vision,
and even though he's passed,
we're still here carrying the torch
and keeping the fire lit.
And we're gonna carry on that vision.
♪♪
-I like this one. He didn't make it up,
but he would always say it.
It's written at Orcas.
"It's unbelievable what you can achieve and build
as long as nobody's worried about getting the credit,
by Mark Hubbard."
That's what he'd always say.
-Mark's ultimate vision was to be able to skate
throughout the United States, from one side of the country
to the other, and there'd be skate parks in between.
♪♪