Blog

06 Aug

Tom's launch of the Noosa Agriculture Hub

Tom Wegener
Noosa Biosphere Agriculture Hub Opening Pages by Cr Tom Wegener I hope to facilitate farmers in Noosa. The focus will be on small market farms and maybe poultry, cattle or pigs. There is an abundance of land zoned for farming in Noosa and much of it is underutilized. Noosa was once agriculture...
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08 Jul

Tom Wegener Noosa Councillor

admin
In March 2020, I was elected as one of seven Noosa Councillors. At the time I thought I would be able to make a few surfboards while acting as a councillor, but I have found that I do not have the time or energy. I am loving the new position and I am putting my all into doing a good job. I have one...
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26 Jun

Papua New Guinea elders teach our place within nature

Tom Wegener
How do we make change in the world? To answer this question we should look at our relationship with nature and society. In the modern world, humans create wealth from extracting value from nature. We control the world. In the in indiginous worldview, humans share gifts with nature (gift economy)...
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16 Jun

Doctor of Surf Culture

Tom Wegener
Tom’s research into the sustainability of the surfboard industry has earned him a Doctor of Philosophy of Surf Culture at the University of the Sunshine Coast. It was a six year journey of research and writing, followed up by many edits & rewrites. "I am infinitely grateful to my wife Margie...
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21 Sep

"The Salt of the Earth" short movie by Dean Saffron

Tom Wegener
Noosa is lucky to have top photo journalist Dean Saffron now in the fold! He is the most frothing dude I have ever met and he took on creating a little clip on me with unbridled enthusiasm. This clip won the best short film at the prominent Anglet Surf Film Festival in France. Please check out his...
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31 Jul

Cork in Noosa movie

Tom Wegener
Last year Sunday, my daughter made this video. It was featured at the Noosa Surf Film Festival and the Green Room Festival in Japan. Thank you Sunday! It has been nearly a year since Sunday made this video and I guess I was hesitant about putting it up on the website because I wanted to be sure the...
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02 Feb

Shaping Classes: Learn to make a Corky

Tom Wegener
Shaping Classes: Learn to make a Corky In my book, Surfboard Artisans For The Love, I discuss the importance of inspired surfers making their own surfboard. It is what keeps the surfboard industry vibrant and what keeps the entire industry alive in Australia and around the world. It perpetuates our...
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22 Jan

Positive feedback from my book Surfboard Artisans For The Love

Tom Wegener
Above: I am presenting a talk on the book at the Patagonia Shop in Encinitas, California and below I am reading at the book Launch at Annie's Books in Perigian Beach, Queensland. The events were well atteneded and a lively surfboard industry followed. Surfboard Artisans For The Love has been out...
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03 Oct

Lets make a Corky

Tom Wegener
Shaping the rails of my Flexible Ultra Noserider (FUN) board. Come to my shed and help make your board. Photo Misha Robb-Mass I have made 11 corkys now and I am totally confident with the process. The finless corky flex beautifully into the wave and hold in like my best alaias. Getting the flex...
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13 Jun

Corky Testing Day

Tom Wegener
Corky quiver with JJ Star: From Left to right; JJ's body board, Finley;s 7'2 alaia style, my 5'6 tuna, 4'6 thin bellyboard and Carlos de Landre's board - the shape needs a name. Top: Sean Cusik holds the tuna shape which is very similar to an albacore shape. I am holding a longer thinner board...
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02 Jun

Book Launch

Tom Wegener
The most valuable thing I can do is pass on what I have learned about surfing and surfboards Why do we get out of bed in the morning? What are the emotions we want to feel and the things we want to experience? What is valuable to us? I know that I really love surfing. I love the feeling, the stoke...
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29 Apr

The New “Corky” Surfboard

Tom Wegener
Finley on Corky #1: This board is 7’2 and slides with the elegance and speed of an alaia but is very buoyant. The Corky Surfboard: A long journey to custom flex and floatation It took one wave on the first alaia on March 5, 2005 to realise that there was another way of surfing. The flex of the wood...
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27 Apr

Noosa Festival of Surfing Finless Division 2016

Tom Wegener
Adam Baldwin, Matt Williams, Fred Branger, Sterling Harper, Josh Woollett,Stuart Jaeys, Carl De Landre and Gus O'Malley The finless comp is the smallest division in the Noosa Festival, and nearly disappeared with GSI pulling out (after generously sponsoring it for four years). I felt honoured to...
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16 May

My Sabbatical Leave from Shaping

Tom Wegener
Hello surfers, I have enrolled in a PhD program at the University of the Sunshine Coast studying the Sustainability of the Surfboard Industry on the Sunshine Coast. I am loving it!!! I feel that the local surfboard industry is forgetting more than it is learning and the culture of inventing and...
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19 Jun

Shaping Classes

Tom Wegener
Come to the Creation Plantation and spend some time with me learning about surfboards. There is a giant world in surfboard shapes and learning about them is a never ending journey. Often customers come to my shaping room and watch me make their board. It takes many hours because I spend most of the...
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22 May

Super Custom Foam Longboards

Tom Wegener
Tom’s Background with Durable Boards : When I was in 7th grade, 1976, I bought my first early 60’s longboard for $11.00. It was a mint condition Wardy that was my favourite board for years. The boards of the 1960’s were made to last. In 1986 I became a team rider for Donald Takayama. He made me beautiful boards but I had to give them back after 6 months because they were still in OK condition and could be sold as used. I never gave them back it time and the deck would delaminate with a big air bubble under the back foot and the board’s value plummeted. Donald would give me a lecture. In my formative years that was the way it was. With California’s Clark foam a board was designed to last 6 months of surfing and then fall apart. Those days never really made it to Australia. The blank manufacturers like Burfords, South Coast and Bennetts never strayed into the stupid consumptionism of the USA. But even in Australia making a proper, super durable board makes the board last a lot longer with less maintenance.
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16 May

Noosa Longboards by Tom Wegener foam boards

Tom Wegener
After a very long journey with hollow wood longboards I have turned my focus back to foam. The foam boards are really quite good and half the price of the wood. It is like coming home. I know the shapes so well. Working with Noosa Longboards I have developed a very good range of models that are always in stock in their store at Hastings Street. It has been a pleasure to work with Tim, Glen, Sam and the entire team at Noosa Longboards to make some new shapes as well as bring back my tried and true old friends like the Model A, the Joker Model, and The bubble
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05 Apr

Fin's Film for NALU

Tom Wegener
As the realease for the next quarterly Japanese surf magazine, NALU approaches we're stoked to have Fin's latest film accompany it. Fin says "It's an insight into what people in Noosa see, especially us groms, and how lucky we are to have influences such as Dane Peterson and Harrison Roach at our...
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01 Apr

Noosa Festival of Surfing Highlights 2013

Tom Wegener
Dane Wilson and Son brave a massive closeout The 2013 Noosa Festival was probably the best ever. The surf was pumping with four days with perfect sunshine. It was GREAT!!! But, the most memorable event for me was sitting on the beach watching the finals as well as a crew surfing the beach peaks in...
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26 Feb

Surfie for Fitness

Tom Wegener
Jennifer Buckle, a stoked surfie rider and health journalist, wanted to mix her passions for fitness and surfing. She graciously sent this article to me. Please check it out. Brittany at Little Cove Surfie for Life: Stay Healthy and Happy Some people might say that if you are not standing up, you...
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13 Feb

Dugout Canoe for David Rastovich

Tom Wegener
Last year David Rastovich called and said that he would like to make a proper dugout canoe. We looked at a lot of logs and agreed that we would do it soon but the time always was pushed back. In January a tremendous storm tore through the Sunshine Coast and the biggest paulownia tree that I have...
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30 Jan

Surfing Backside on the Finless Boards

Tom Wegener
Surfing backside on the finless has been problematic for many people including me. I constantley revert back to finned surfboard thinking and stomp on the back corner in hopes that it will help the edge dig in to the face. With a thin alaia this works a little but with the Seaglass Tuna and...
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03 Jan

Albacore Surfing with Jacob Pedrana

Tom Wegener
Check this new Albacore video: Jacob Pedrana at Sunshine Beach Jacob has been pushing the albacore harder than anyone I know. Like most finless riders, he was a bit timid on going backside but then he focused on it and figured it out. Now he perfers backside more than frontside. You actually have...
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14 Nov

Surfie art by Sunday and surfing by Tom

Tom Wegener
The Surfie is a fun board to decorate as well as surf!
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07 Nov

Surfie Odyssey photos

Tom Wegener
As a back up to the last blog post, here are some frame grabs from the last few weeks of Surfie sessions at the beach where there was nobody else out. The surf was too small for everyone else but we had a blast! We all claim to be this person. Margie slides her heart away before work. Riley cuts...
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07 Nov

Camel the Seaglass Ripper

Tom Wegener
A very distinguished surfer from West Australia known as Camel has been riding the Seaglass and the Albacore. His surf adventures through Indonesia are legendary and his tube riding is the best in the world. Last year he won the best “tuberide” with this ride: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=...
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21 Oct

Surfie Odyssey

Tom Wegener
Finley and I have been on a Surfie Odyssey for the last two weeks. The surf has been small, clean and warm and we are spending a lot of time in the tube. We always have five or more surfies with us and every day we share them around with anyone interested.
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28 Sep

Development of the Seaglass Project Tuna and Albacore

Tom Wegener
The tuna is the completion of a vision that I had the first moment I saw Jake ride that first faithful wave an alaia in 2005, "Oh my god, you don't need a fin!!!" Tom Blake put fin on a surfboard in 1936 but they did not really become a necessary part of surfboards for almost a generation. Could we have lost something special when we abandoned the finless surfing some time in the late 1950s?
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21 Sep

Origin of the Surfie Surfboard

Tom Wegener
My introduction to the wood belly board was backward. I made replicas of the boards I saw in the Bishop Museum in Hawaii and found how fun they are to surf. I was wondering why nobody else surfs like this. Then I discovered there were pockets of stoked wood belly boards in the UK and Hawaii. Once I looked deeper, I found that 100 years ago there was a wave of belly boarding popularity that went around the world.
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10 Jul

Alaias, Paipos and Albacores: This year's focus

Tom Wegener
This year, 2012, I have been narrowing down the boards that I make. I am focussing on the boards that I am still developing and super passionate about at this time.
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