Infinity’s Dave Boehne x Gotcha bring the 80s vibes back

“Legacy is greater than currency” quote* resonates strongly when looking at brands that have a unique ability to capture the culture and spirit of their time and translate it into their projects and concepts driven by ambition, risk, innovation and creativity. So when a renowned California surf board label matches up with a legendary “80’s trailblazer” – epic things happen.

TotalSUP caught up with the unstoppable Infinity’s boss Dave Boehne to chat about his latest collaboration with the iconic surf brand Gotcha & ImageKult  that brought some gripping board designs blending heritage, “art and function” and the new aesthetics that we may soon find in Infinity’s SUP models.

Hi Dave, what’s the story behind your latest collaboration with the iconic and newly re-launched Gotcha brand and Mike Funk/ImageKult?

Infinity Surfboards and Gotcha have a long lineage dating back to the early days of the legendary brand! We were one of the first surf shops to carry the brand in the store and shared many team riders throughout that time. At one point before “flagship” stores that most brands have today, our shop was a Gotcha concept store and of course Gotcha was my first real sponsor as a 12-year old grommet!

So this collaboration brought back many great memories and of course was super fun to be a part of. Mike Funk is a world renowned artist and was Gotcha’s art director at the time. He was known as one of the key guys behind some of Gotchas most iconic ads.

Fresh, authentic and unruly, from its inception in the late 70s, Gotcha has been more than just a surf and skate brand, embodying the youth culture itself and strongly resonating across (industries from surf to streetwear)… What is your experience with the brand?

Gotcha was a big part of surf culture when I was growing up. It was every surfers dream to be a part of the movement. All the best surfers rode for Gotcha and they were leading the way for influential surf culture. I was a team rider as an aspiring pro surfer for Gotcha and later I was fortunate to move to the MCD brand as well. Fun years of my life for sure!

This collab seems to be perfectly aligned with Infinity’s #50YearsOfShred celebrating your brand, your heritage and surf culture in general…

Exactly! It’s a perfect collaboration. Infinity is a legacy California surf board label, matched up with the legendary Gotcha brand with all history there it made up for a really fun project that I am proud of.

“Perfect blend of art and function”…Could you tell us more about the design process and those “patterns of progression”?

Gotcha has always been a brand that bleeds the lines of what it is and what it means to people. Of course it’s rooted in surf but it’s always blurred the lines between surf, skate, street, art, music, all of that and way before anyone else was doing it. Infinity has been the same in the way we’ve always made all kinds of boards not just shortboards not just longboards not just paddleboards. We make it all and have been for over 50 years now.

So we wanted to select a board design that was time period appropriate that matched up with the late 80’s and early 90’s marketing that Gotcha was doing. Shuffling through the archive of board designs I quickly settled in on a shape we made called the “hook rail” which ties in perfectly. Mike Funk selected his favourite ads, logos and art and build the collage in which we made four limited edition boards. Complete with glassed on fins and a high gloss finish these boards are truly one of a kind art pieces.

Will we see any of this aesthetics and influence in your SUP board designs?

I’ve actually been working on a few concepts with Bernd Roediger. He has a Hook Rail SUP that he seems to really like and is absolutely ripping on. He’s also got a twin fin SUP a short stubby speedy little thing so hopefully soon we’ll zero in on the next model.

Epic! We can’t wait to see more of this collab!

To find out more about Infinity SUP, visit infinity-sup.com

Follow Infinity and Dave Boehne on Instagram

*Quote: Gary Vaynerchuk

**All images courtesy of Dave Boehne