New Year New Studio

Around February last year I approached Mark Kemp of FortyTwo Studio about the availability of one of the spaces in their new office - the old Church Centre at 35 Mid Stocket Road. Intention was to migrate the whole Doric HQ there.

“Hey Mark, would you consider us as a tenant in your building?”

“Aye, lets talk”

And that’s how it started.

I’d been in the building a fare few times before. We did some photoshoots there when Mark acquired the building just as COVID hit. And whilst I absolutely love the building and all its brutalist features, I hadn’t considered the idea of a “studio” in a while. But in November 22 I posted a pic of a screen print studio (pic below) and how i’d love to have something like that, maybe combined with a shop one day. And whilst the Studio at 35 isn’t a shop, it’s a firm base for us to grow, collaborate and generally develop as a business. And it isn’t in the flat at the top of a ladder in a windowless loft (jokes, I love you loft!).

And so on the 13th December I got handed the keys to our new kingdom!

If you’ve seen our loft you might think how on earth I managed to fill the space. Well I spent from February to Dec sketching - with pencils and in my mind - about where things would go and what it would be like. My original sketch is down below too and isn’t far off!

And so during Christmas and New Year I gathered together my one drill (try pre drilling, counter sinking and screwing with one drill dozens of times!), my two hand saws, scrap wood, new wood and a bucket of enthusiasm and got to it. We build 5 tables for packing orders, curing ink, sorting ink, general messing about and storage. We inherited FortyTwos old table and used that for our screen print press’s. Our old desk came down from the loft and is now a desk again - this is where the print press was before! Countless trips back and forth, a few trips to B&Q (I grew accustomed to the burger van cheeseburgers) and by first week of Jan I was pretty much good to go!

We are of course still settling in and have plenty to do - plants, more shelving, deck wracks, sort out storage, recycling bin - the list is endless. And so this weekend we’ll get printing.

I can’t emphasise enough how different it is already, never mind the printing aspect.! My plan is to simply do what I did before but improve on the process, make good use of the space to print more in each run when needed. I’d also hope to open the doors to visitors at some point - we’ll work out what that looks like later in the year!

Maybe one day i’ll manage to print for other folks too. I have to be realistic and know that whilst working FT and doing Doric I can’t really commit to too much other stuff at the moment!

Thanks to everyone who’s supported us over the last 7 years. I don’t rush anything in life and this is no different! But this is like Stage 2 for Doric. Lets see what its got in store!

Why We Hope You Support Us - Part 1

The other month on Social Media we wanted to highlight some of the reasons you might want to shop with us.

Some of you will hopefully know these already but I wanted to go a bit deeper.

Starting with a Blog Post about Post. : )

We include postage cost in all our stuff - it keeps things simple for us and I hope for you too.

We also value the fact that you have spent money with us. And so I try to get your order out very quickly, sometimes the same day.

We aren’t waiting for more orders or only posting once or twice a week. It’s not hard and it’s kinda the whole point!

So that’s part 1 of this series of why we think you should shop with us. It’s not a very exciting one but it’s key.

And while I’m here. This parcel box on Carden Place is a god send. If you are the absolute tube who consistently jams it up with your over sized boxes then I really hope ye catch yer jacket pocket on a door handle soon.

Part 2 of 7 tomorrow - Giving Back.

Fear.....

My list of fears are large and varied.

One of my earliest memories is being at my brothers school assembly of some kind at Bramble Brae Primary Northfield circa 1980.

There must have been a performance and we had to clap. Surrounded by strangers I felt something that made me clench my fists and clap like that instead. Somewhere inside I realised that clapping made a noise, noise brings attention, attention brings people. And I didn’t want that. At least thats my memory of it.

A few years later I may or may not have swallowed a bit of lego (it never “passed”). I had to stay in hospital overnight and as I lay there tucked in like I was planning an escape (I probably was) I felt a cough coming.

I held it in because I didn’t want the attention of the staff on the ward. But what happened was a small cough turned into a loud splutter and my intentions were in tatters as the staff came running.!

It seems bizarre to me and possibly disingenuous to you that I would write this blog post, do videos, podcasts, social media, work shops etc all in the name of starting a business and be scared of attention. But then we are complicated creatures full of contradictions and I’m no different.

What has any of this got to do with Doric Skateboards, skateboarding, screen printing, design blah blah?

None of this started out with a plan and a destination. It ‘s just morphed and grown in various directions organically. Perhaps if I had been more business/financially focused I’d be writing this on a brand new macbook (and not my day job laptop) and be doing this full or part time. Perhaps I would be following a Dropship type business model for the clothing. But I do things my way for good or bad! Thats not to say I don’t take advice, I really do. No one is a one man band.

I work on my fears all the time. Each time I post on social media or do one of these I am already second guessing what people will think, followed swiftly by the other part of me that tells me people are way less interested in me and what I do than I think. ; )

I’ll always be a fearful person. Its like that game where you whack all those moles with a hammer, then one more pops up! I conquer one for a day and then it transfers to something else. My main fear now is getting back on my skateboard. It consumes my thoughts at times and the longer it goes the bigger its built up. I am 100% embarrassed by how bad I am and that is part of what stops me.

My approach to handling these things has always been the same. When I was young and went to the skatepark I was elated when it was empty. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy skating with friends (shout out Team Oatcake!) - I did. But if I was solo I didn’t have the social skills to adapt if there was a group there. So if it was empty I would anxiously have fun until more people turned up then I would slink away.

And 25ish years later when I started to learn to screen print I would turn up to Peacocks Studio with some screens under my arm. But if anyone else was there I would either:

1. Change my mind and go home.

2. Do the absolute bare minimum and then scurry away.

3. At all times keep what I was doing hidden so no one could see it.

I’ve become way more relaxed when going to Peacocks now. I understand when people think of these places as pretentious, arty places that are impenetrable.

Some of that is true. ; )

But mostly its just normal folk getting on with their own thing.

Will I find the same peace of mind with getting back on my board? Will I find the confidence I had a few years ago when I would go for wee night time skates on my own?

Who knows?

Donuts for Daze and other news....

Its been a really busy start to the year for Doric Skateboards. After the Christmas madness we took the time to plan out some things for the year ahead.

If you follow us on social media you’ll maybe have caught a glimpse of the new design.! Really stoked to be working with local loon Chris Graham again. Check him out on Instagram here. Release date is Saturday 29th February.

This new one is a ramp up for us in a few ways:

• Tail graphics. We’ve never done anything on the tail of the screen printed designs. Its definitely a bit harder but we’ve engineered something that works.!

• 3 colour topside logo. Way way back we did two colour topside logos for the Jetpack Dinosaur collaboration. This time we’ve went 3. Now i know that a lot of people simply grip tape over the topside but i prefer to do them anyways. And doing 3 colours requires a lot of time and patience. Working within the concave of the deck can be really tricky - its all muscle memory eventually though.!

• 6 screen graphic. For the main graphics we used 6 separate screens/layers. This is on top of the 4 for the tail and the 3 for the topside. That’s a total of 13 passes needed to complete one deck. I think the finished article will show where that effort has went.

• Multi screen clothing. For the last collaboration deck we did with Fit Like we dipped our toe into screening the clothing too. That was all one colour stuff. This time its multi colour/screen designs so we’ve invested in some new equipment to facilitate. Excited to get going with it and show it all off.!

So keep your eyes peeled for the reveal early/mid February for the release on the 29th Feb.!

In other news:

• Organic clothing. We’ll slowly move on to clothing that is at very least ethically sound but also coming from organic cotton. I’m well aware that i’m producing “stuff” and sometimes the world/us don’t need more.! So the least i can do is make sure its better for the environment. The goal by the end of the year is to have all tees/hoodies done with this sort of clothing.

• Future collaborations/designs. We’ve got a firm date for another deck and clothing design plus other new bits and pieces in the first 6 months.

• 3rd Bday Bash. Possibly schedule another Bday Bash this April.!

• Pop Ups. Some planned already - others TBC.

• We added a load of screen printing tutorials to the YouTube channel. Please head there and subscribe.! : ) We also added it to the website here.

• Last year we added a page to the website that features people, business’s, organisations, brands, artists etc that we admire. Check it out here. You might find something you want/need!

• We also restocked some of our stuff. Plenty of PoP tees in Black, White and Olive Green. !

• And to make room for new stuff you can grab the Scotch Tee design on sale for a bargain £10 posted.!! Black Front Print, Black Back Print, White Front Print, White Back Print and a kids one (aged 3-4 years old) for a fiver.!

Next month we’ll have revealed the new design in its entirety - we hope you like it.! Until then - thanks for the support. : )

2019 Review!

2019 was a busy year. Perhaps too busy! Some stuff fell off the list and I maybe stretched myself at times and rushed a few things!

Lessons learned.

But thought it was worth a wee chronological look back at the highlights!.

Doric x Honk Part 2 -Jan/Feb

The year kicked off with a collaboration with my old mucker Justin Lawrie aka Honk! This one we called Freedom. Freedom to do what you want (as long as it isn’t something despicable!). Tees and decks were done and this was my best multi screen print to that point. 4 screens that combined to create the graphic plus another to create the logo on top and bottom. First run was sold out as were the tees - so we added some more. Lesson learned there as I still have a few left. I’m not Santa Cruz yet. 😂

These went on display at the flagship Brewdog bar for a while - really appreciated that opportunity to give a little more exposure.

You can still grab a deck and a tee!

Doric Drop In Number 2 - 8th February

We put on our second Doric Drop in at Transition in February. The idea was/is to attract those folk that stay away. Maybe they are intimidated, maybe its been a while, maybe they just want to hang around the first time and see the skatepark. This one wasn’t as well attended as the one the previous (Nov 2018) but we still saw some folk come through for it and at very least we are trying something.

AALF - Arts Across Learning Festival with Creative Learning and Small Stories - Feb/March

Around February/March time we were lucky enough to get involved with AALF - Arts Across Learning Festival. We were honoured to be asked by Creative Learning to pair up with our pal Small Stories to create a number of workshops for primary school children. This all culminated in us screen printing some of the designs to donate to the schools. You can read about it here!

Doric 2nd year Bday bash - March

March saw us take over Transition Extreme for our 2nd bday bash.! Cake. Pop up. Free skate. What more could you want?

We had folk from Fraserburgh, Peterhead, Elgin, Inverness, Perth, Glasgow and of course Aberdeen all there having a skate. Same time next year? Aye maybe!

Inspired Nights on the Green/NuArt - April

April 18th saw NuArt return to Aberdeen. Its never really away - all the artwork remains and its great to see it change over the seasons - but each year see’s a new influx of artists and events.!

We were lucky enough to get a pitch at the Inspired Nights event -if you haven’t been please check it out next year! Good food, drink, music and a great place to join in the NuArt tours or just explore on your own. This year we were also asked if we wanted to provide a little something for the artists, so we did a limited run of Doric Skyline tees using the colours of NuArt. We added a little something to the design to differentiate - look closely to see!

We returned to Inspired Night another two or three times during the summer and glad to say we didn’t get rained off once!

Chris Graham - Collaboration Spider from Deep Fried Mars - April

Around the same time in April we launched a new design. Spider from Deep Fried Mars - designed by local lad Chris Graham. Check out his instagram here.!

This all started with a Spider with wee lightning bolts in his eyes. This made me think of Bowie’s Spider from Mars. And whenever i think of Mars i think of Mars Bars….and so it became Spider from Deep Fried Mars (deep fried mars are a bit of a delicacy in certain chip shops up here!). This was our second dabble into deck printed “digitally”. We’ll use this when it works and this one certainly did! These decks flew out and we’ll look to always hold a few.! You can grab one here.

Really happy to have worked with Chris and he’ll continue to be part of the Doric team for the foreseeable future if he’ll have us!

Fraser Price - 1st Doric Team Rider - April

We’d never really thought much about a “team” before. Seen a load of brands do teams before they are even a brand. I take my time with everything (mostly) so it took me an age to make this decision. Once i did it was easy to pick the first rider. I’ll say it until i’m blue in the face - the first thing i’m looking for is attitude. I’ve got zero interest in grumpy, wannabe tough guys who skate with a grimace.

Fraser ticked all the boxes. Good guy. Supportive. Enthused. Empathetic. And of course - he can skate.! Look forward to working more with Fraser next year! Thanks to him for getting the Doric brand!

Doric x John Walter Collaboration - April/May/June

Around early 2018 a chance encounter saw me chatting to John Walter on Instagram where he suggested getting his mural on a deck. For anyone not in Aberdeen - John was commissioned a few years back to create a mural consisting of “Aberdeen” people (i don’t think thats the exact wording of the brief but you get the idea!). The very first Doric deck design was of Aberdeen’s Annie Lennox - John had also included her in his mural so i was very excited to do this one! Some time passed and it wasn’t until this we really got going - i produced a test deck and then a proper “artist proof”. John was involved in the Look Again Festival here in Aberdeen so it made sense to launch the deck then. I won’t lie - i was very nervous about showing him the deck. My screen printing has improved but these were a real test.! Happy to say John was really happy with them and you never know - we might do something again in the future!

Pete Barrett - 2nd Doric Team Rider - 21st June

The wonderful side of social media is the ability to reach out and connect with people. I’ve been lucky enough to be involved with some of the skate groups on Facebook over the years where I’ve met (virtually and in real terms) some great folks! One of those is Pete! When i started Doric Skateboards he was on board straight away and after meeting him i knew that if i had a “team” he’d be on it! So i was really pleased that he was up for it! More from the team next year and maybe an addition or two? Who knows!

Etsy Summer Showcase - June

This years pop up for Etsy was at the Anatomy Rooms. Great venue and a really good laugh. The bum bag was back out and sales were made.! Its always great to see returning customers. And always appreciated. Also - the efforts the Etsy team make (as well as all the other sellers!) is worth a mention!

Broch Skate Club - July

This year we cemented our friendship with our pals in the Broch by screen printing some Broch Skate Club decks to raise money and the profile of their efforts. They are currently hard at work trying to get a major upgrade to the skate park facilities there - i’m always happy to support them. There is no pretension with these folks - just a total community and inclusive vibe. And i’ve had major support from them from day one. Can’t wait to get involved next year with whatever they are doing and in whatever capacity!

Young Creatives Skateboard Screen printing with Gary Kemp Hosted by Peacock Visual Arts - August

In 2018 we dipped our toes into some presentations and workshops. This year we went full on and did a screen yer own deck at Peacock Visual Arts.

Peacock Visual Arts is where i prepare my screens to screen print with. Its where i learned and continue to learn! But i screen all my decks at home. I’ve not really screen printed in front of anyone. I’ve done some videos to showcase it but not really with actual people there!

So doing this and walking people through it was a challenge! But i think the people that signed up enjoyed it. I think next time we could do a two part class - first one design, second one print. Keep your eyes peeled!!

Grays School of Art - YES SKATEBOARDING and 2nd Year Design Students Skateboard Project 

A chance encounter with John Welsh at Transition one evening led to this. John works at Grays and was looking to work with the Denis Law Trust on some skateboard designs. The Denis Law trust had successfully rid the city of No Ball Games signs - perhaps someone could do the same or at least highlight the No Skateboarding signs. Myself and John chatted about various designs over a few months and eventually John produced some absolute belters! They are for sale and in the new year i’ll make some space on the website to try to facilitate this.

Sometime later in the year i was asked to come in and talk to the 2nd Year design students about what i’ve done and skateboard design. Really honoured to do this.! They class of 60 had a project to design a deck with the winning one getting printed. Myself and Adam of IFive and Your Custom Skateboard picked our top 5. Happy to say we both picked 4 of the same! Congratulations to the winner Anca Tomescu for the playing card inspired design.

Doric X Fit Like Collaboration. November 1st.

The latest collaboration was with local artist Fit Like. A play on the the Day of the Dead Sugar Skulls - this one was full of Aberdeen based imagery.

Another chance for me to screen print multi layers that complimented Fit Likes spray paint - i really enjoyed this one and it proved popular. All decks were sold by launch night. Speaking of launch night - we held this at Fierce Bar. A cracking pub that is the flagship for local brewery Fierce Beer. Some serious hangovers the next day for sure.!

This collaboration gave me the first chance to screen print the clothing too. I’ve been building up to it and went for it with this one. We ended up doing nearly 40 T-Shirts, 20 Tote bags, 9 or so hoodies and 20 decks. A few tees remain - grab them here and a few totes - grab those here!

Read more about this collaboration here.

Doric & Friends Drop In at TX - November 23rd

For this Doric Drop in we decided to invite a few folk. The idea was to create a sort of Pop Up event with artists/.makers/organisations/brands. You can read all about it here!

Suffice to say it was a success and plans are afoot to follow up next year with something similar!

Etsy Christmas Showcase

As winter approaches so do events. Really pleased to be part of the local Etsy community. If you’ve never been then keep your eyes open for summer 2020. Its packed full of talented makers/designers etc - and us! ; )

This one was no exception. At most events I’ll get some passing trade - people who’ve never heard of us but like it. But what’s also really exciting is the return of people who’ve made purchases before.

Thanks to all that came and supported all the makers there.!

Christmas in the Quad

This leads us directly onto Christmas in the Quad! Within the confines of the magnificent Marischall College we had our wee hut for two stints this year. Much like the Etsy event we saw plenty of new customers and loads of returning ones.! Can’t thank folk enough for just saying hello - its all much appreciated.!

This last weekend finished on the 22nd and was a really successful one for us.!

And that’s that for 2019 pretty much! We have a wee sale on (discount code DORICBOX gets you 20% off!).

Thank you to everyone who’ve supported us and look out for more in 2020!

Doric x Fit Like at Fierce Beer Bar Aberdeen

Well that was a fun night. Next morning wasn’t too clever but thats a distant memory now,.!

We decided to do something a little different with this launch - firstly we revealed the full graphic a couple of weeks before release. By the time we’d announced the collaboration we’d already sold nearly half the stock of decks and tees. When we revealed the actual graphics we had to do another run of tees and were left with just 3 out of the 20 decks. Really pleased with that and can’t thank people enough.!

So on the night at Fierce we sold the remaining 3 and a few other bits and pieces but also got a chance to have a chat with some new people and some friends who’d come down to have a beer.!

Its pretty gratifying when folk from the local community support what you are doing - i hope i do the same for them. I try to share other peoples stuff on the Doric page and on my own page. It really can make a difference.

Coming up to Christmas you’ll see a load of posts about supporting local and F Amazon (the website, not the jungle - i hope). I say support what you can. If you can’t afford to buy bespoke clothing or hand made something or other then lets not guilt each other into debt. Sharing a FB post or re-tweeting or commenting/recommending is a fantastic way to help out your local business’s. Buying stuff is obviously welcome but not everyone’s budget stretches that far. I’ve definitely benefited from both and very much appreciate it.!

And talking of appreciation - big thanks to Fit Like for this collaboration. And to the team at Fierce Bar Aberdeen for hosting us.!

So whats next in terms of collaborations? Well we’ve almost definitely got 3 lined up for next year already. Some artwork locked, some not even thought of! So watch this space!

Fit Like? Nae bad, yersel?

As promised in the last blog, this one will have a look at the most recent collaboration.!

This one is between myself and local street artist Fit Like Art.

Fit Like came up with a concept very early in the year but due to its subject nature we had to keep it until November 2nd!

Once this design was locked it was over to Fit Like to use stencils to throw up some graphics on the nose and tail of each deck. Screen printing on the nose and tail will require a bit more development in equipment for me but doing it this way made perfect sense. FL used a variety of stencils to recreate his collectives logo and his own logo along with liberal splatterings of ink.! This makes each deck unique.

It was then over to me to screen print the run. I’d already done a dry run of the main graphic and at the last minute decided on the green, white, red fade. Originally i had thought of just a white undercoat.

But first the topside logos needed done. They can be a right bugger to do - you are screening with the concave and need to be quick, firm and steady.! It can lead to mistakes….

Once done it was time for the main graphic. Using the 3 colour fade for the undercoat can be messy - you might need to clean out the screen every now and then. The wee detailing is done with a sliver and then the main black outline - its amazing how it all comes together.

I took the opportunity to produce the whole run of tees and totes for this collaboration. I had messed around with printing on other mediums but this was a whole new thing. Thankfully i got through it with minimum waste.! Its a different ball game doing it on clothing. Screening on a curved, shiny surface of a skateboard has its challenges but so does clothing.! Ink consumption being one - didn’t really factor just how much it would eat up!

Super stoked with the response to this one so far though. We have a planned launch night at Fierce Bar on Nov 1st. Hopefully we’ll still have something to sell! 😃 I’ll make sure we have a few extra tees.!

From this we jump on to the next event at Transition Extreme. Head over to the Facebook Page event for more info. Really looking forward to this one.!

To keep in touch with where we will be this year (Chr*stmas) check out the websites Whats Happening page.! I’ll hopefully be adding an event or two to that soon.! And maybe another collaboration to sneak in.! ??