Jack Del-Rennie - Beige Surfboards

At 21 years of age, Jack Del-Rennie’s the youngest shaper featured in this series. Hailing from Wensleydale, Jack’s a purveyor (and creator) of top-notch alternative boards that are built to perform in powerful Surf Coast conditions. Jack’s shaping style is loose, and has minimal boundaries. He creates boards based on the feeling he wants to achieve while riding a wave, and he wants to draw different lines to his peers.

If you love pin-tail bonzers or a solid retro log, get a Beige under your feet.

Tell us about the first board you ever shaped.

I shaped my first board with Darcy Day who was working at Maurice Cole’s place a few years ago. We made a little bonzer, and it went pretty good, and from there I set up a shaping bay at home and started making a few boards for myself. I was getting them glassed by Matty Shay from Pale Horse to start with, and he helped point me in the right direction with my board design and glassing techniques.

Who inspires you?

There probably isn’t really any shapers I take inspiration from that are based on the Surf Coast. The whole reason I started shaping boards was because the types of boards I wanted to ride, I couldn’t find locally. I was more interested in boards and shapers from overseas; I liked a lot of Gato’s and BMT’s, thinner and more foiled-out logs and mid-lengths. These boards inspired and informed by shaping – they still do.

Describe your boards and shaping style.

I guess they have a ‘retro’ aesthetic, but they function very differently to the boards from previous eras. A few of my boards have similar outlines to boards from the 60’s and 70’s, but they’re a lot thinner and foiled-out than those older boards, making them a little more user-friendly and easier to surf in critical conditions.

I shape those styles of boards because I enjoy the way they perform more than shorter or modern ‘high performance’ boards. It’s a different experience riding boards that allow you to glide and trim (like a traditional log), but when you want to put them on rail and surf them more aggressively, you need the shape to enable that.

As surfers, we’re constantly searching for that magic all-rounder that you can have fun on every single surf. For me, I’m usually seeking a board that’s functional – but sometimes all I want to ride is something super-retro and rad.

In a surf world dominated by high-performance thrusters, do you see a future for your style of boards, particularly on the Surf Coast?

Absolutely! Of course there’s a future for them. True, my boards aren’t for everyone but that’s because they’re totally different to boards with single-to-double concaves, as most of my shapes have convex bottoms from tip to tail. Like everything in surfing, if people approach them with an open-mind, I think most would be surprised by they way (and how well) they perform.

@beigesurfboards