Former: “Not a ‘finger your child’ site!”

Do we live in an age of ruthlessly enforced egalitarianism?

Former, Dane Reynolds/Craig Anderson + skateboarder Austyn Gillette’s super brand, has been out in the world now for over two weeks and are you quietly thrilled by its existence or do you not care?

Have you stopped by the website? Have you filled your cart only to leave it there or did you click the “check out” button?

Are you wearing Luxury29.99 whilst sipping your morning coffee?

Quiet thrill or indifference, it takes a hefty amount of work to bring dreams to life and Austyn Gillette opened up to skateboard magazine Jenkem and said some interesting things, particularly as it relates to our surf world. It is rare, I suppose, to have an informed outside opinion and worth reading!

On the .xxx web address…

We actually had to go through this really strenuous process to get that URL and prove we’re not some sort of black market, underground, finger-your-child website. That took a long time but luckily we got it. We didn’t want to compromise with anything else.

On why the clothing pieces are not named Dane, Craig etc….

We’re trying to create this community, we’re all into everything that we’re presenting, so why would we have a product named after someone and push someone to the forefront? Nobody is getting pushed to the forefront, and that’s cool. It took a long time to figure out how we were going to do that.

On the surf brands being run by surfers…

None, none of them.

On why…

It’s a different cliquey environment than skating. If you do something just a little bit off and the community turns its back on you, you can’t fucking surf at certain places. It’s a weird thing. Mainly because it’s an ego thing, like using your name to make money or start a brand, even though there’s these guys that ride for Rusty and Billabong. People think it’s really cheesy and lame using your name, and it’s frowned upon in surfing.

And I suppose this is the section of the interview most interesting to me. Is it true that the ego is now considered uncool? That a ruthlessly enforced egalitarianism is what the kids are practicing? Did these three, Dane + Craig + Austyn, really hate the way that their respective brands put their names and pictures on things to sell? Did they hate that Kelly Slater was primary, during their shared Quiksilver years? Or did Dane dislike when he became “the guy?”

It confuses me, I suppose. Former is all about the personalities involved but at the same time a repudiation, it seems, of the very concept of “personality.” I also wonder what happens if someone does “get pushed to the forefront?” Like, what if one of the founders happens to be a liiiiitttttllllle more talented than the others? Will he get tall poppied? Cut down to size?

So many societal questions! Do you have the answers?

P.S. It seems Former is going to bring on the fabulously gay skater Brian Anderson too!