Sometimes the best communities spring up from a personal desire to simply just meet more people.
Amy Scott-Pillow and Emily Jones, the founders of @weskatesoton are a living, breathing example of this truth. Since starting this female led, open to all, skateboarding community in 2021, the pair have become inseparable, often mistaken for being a couple.
One of the challenges of opening up board sports to all communities, is whether to make them closed off, gated environments for that community, or whether this makes the problem worse. The @weskatesoton crew have managed to bridge this divide perfectly, creating a welcoming space, online and off, for people to embrace the fun of skateboarding, and find their own place in the culture.
The community is now an official CIC, and they have run events like their recent exhibition and film ‘We Skate, We Vibe’, showing that skating isn’t just a sport, it’s a form of play and self-expression.
This conversation explored so many topics from the very personal (Emily’s journey with breast cancer and going into early menopause) to the contrast between real life experiences of male skaters (always positive) and their online experiences (somewhat abhorrent).
We cover:
And one final bit of advice from the ladies if you’re just starting out in the world of skateboarding,
“Everyone was a beginner at some point. Everyone will remember that feeling of first stepping on a board and being like, oh my god, what am I doing? I'm stepping on a plank of wood with wheels on. What is this?”
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Host: Caroline Keylock
Producer: Selma Chalabi
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
