Dave Allee is the owner of Almond Surfboards in Newport Beach. At 24 years old, he rep­re­sents a new breed of surfer/shaper/shop owner who is tak­ing full con­trol of his cre­ative out­put. We inter­view him as he jug­gles the respon­si­bil­i­ties of run­ning a busi­ness and just hav­ing fun.

What was it like grow­ing up in Newport Beach?
It was great. I didn’t really real­ize it was some­where to be cov­eted until high school, when they started mak­ing movies and shows about it. Newport is rad because you can bike every­where when you’re young, or even now, dur­ing the sum­mer. Being a short bike ride away from the beach is some­thing I hope to never take for granted. And Newport is inter­est­ing because so much surf cul­ture and so much of the surf indus­try is here. RVCA, Hurley, Volcom, Quiksilver… it’s all right here in Orange County.

When did you get your first surf­board?
I don’t think I got my own surf­board until 7th grade. It was a 7’8 tri-fin. I surfed it for a few years, but I’m happy to have moved on to big­ger and bet­ter surfboards.

What was the feel­ing you had when you you first stood on a surf­board?
I was in ele­men­tary school. I was prob­a­bly filled with excite­ment and a lit­tle bit of ter­ror. I wasn’t “hooked” on the feel­ing until years later.

Who did you look up to and admire when you were a young boy?
My Dad, for sure. The rea­son I got into shap­ing was because I wanted to have some cre­ative projects to work on with him. That’s what inspired the solid balsa sin­glefin we made a few years ago. That’s where it all began.

What inspired you to own your own shop at such an early age?
To be hon­est, I was a bit opposed to start­ing a surfboard/clothing com­pany because it seemed overly cliché. But I was really enjoy­ing the cre­ative out­let that shap­ing and art was pro­vid­ing. And it was a fun project to get friends involved with… so I kinda couldn’t resist. The shop came about in January of this year, when things were start­ing to grow and progress a ton for us, and I was feel­ing ready to quit my job and devote my time solely to Almond. It just seemed like a nat­ural pro­gres­sion for us, with the direc­tion things were head­ing. The shop has been incred­i­ble. It’s been no small task, but I’m thrilled with how it’s gone thus far.

What is your process for shap­ing a board?
We do all of our shap­ing by hand. I’m kind of old fash­ioned in the sense that I put value in doing things “the right way.” There are so many tal­ented peo­ple out there, and I think it’s impor­tant to honor the crafts­men and excel in your field. Rather than machin­ing our stuff when things got busy, we brought Griffin Neumann-Kyle onto the team to help share the work­load. One of the best deci­sions I ever made. It took a few boards for us to get on the same page, but now things are going super smoothly and we’ve got a great sys­tem going. He’s such a tal­ented shaper, I’m so stoked to have him around.

Of all the places you have trav­eled to, what place in par­tic­u­lar stands out? And why?
Africa for sure. No mat­ter how much you think you know what it’s going to be like, you will still be blown away. I don’t want to say too much, other than I would hope that most every­one could visit there at some point in their lives.

Who/what inspires you?
Wow, that’s tough… I draw inspi­ra­tion from so many places. Obviously there are peo­ple in the surf indus­try who are incred­i­bly tal­ented who I draw inspi­ra­tion from. Guys like Terry Martin, Andy Davis, Tyler Warren, Kyle Lightner, Cyrus Sutton, Nathan Oldfield, Thomas Campbell, Mitch Abshere, Tom Wegener, Nathan Adams, Alex Knost, Dan Forte, John Cherry, Levi Prairie, JJ Wessels, Mason Jennings. The list goes on and on.

There is inspi­ra­tion every­where though; so many aes­thet­ics and atti­tudes to draw from. Many of the inspi­ra­tions aren’t even visual. They’re musi­cal or intan­gi­ble. That’s the beauty of cre­ativ­ity, there are so many things to pull from and draw from and you get to take your own twist on it and make it your own.

What is the great­est thing you have learned in your life?
To rec­og­nize the impor­tant things in life, and to keep it all in per­spec­tive. It’s so easy to get caught up in the moment, and to get worn down by life. But it’s so impor­tant to be able to see the big­ger pic­ture. I have so much to be thank­ful for. There are days that are tough, and there are tasks that seem over­whelm­ing, but being reminded of the impor­tant things in life helps keep it all manageable. There have been many great lessons in my 24 years of liv­ing, but I think per­spec­tive is a good over­ly­ing theme.

Do you have any regrets or wish you had done some­thing dif­fer­ently?
There are always things we wish we had done dif­fer­ently. Conversations, mis­takes, frus­tra­tions. But at the end of the day all of our mis­takes are learn­ing expe­ri­ences. And they help us grow up into respon­si­ble, rea­son­able adults. So I don’t think I would go back and change anything.

What mean­ing does surf­ing hold for you and how has it changed your life?
Surfing is a really hard thing to describe. On a prac­ti­cal level, it’s just a great way to start the day. I like get­ting my day started early and get­ting in the water for a few hours. It’s a unique chance to be out­doors and active on a super reg­u­lar basis. It’s fun alone, it’s even more fun with friends. It’s smooth and grace­ful. No wave is ever the same, so there is always oppor­tu­nity for a new, unique expe­ri­ence and new challenges.

Surfing has been a huge cre­ative and phys­i­cal out­let and a means to meet a ton of really talented, really cool peo­ple. And there’s always that lin­ger­ing desire to go back for more, no mat­ter how frus­trat­ing or ful­fill­ing it gets.

What brings you the most hap­pi­ness in the world?
At the expense of sound­ing like a 3rd grader, friends and fam­ily, and expe­ri­enc­ing life with them. There are so many excit­ing places to see and things to do in life. And it’s so much more fun to do them with peo­ple you love.

Who are some of the peo­ple you feel are shap­ing the path for surf­ing today?
Definitely all of the same peo­ple who I think inspire me, I would def­i­nitely say are inspir­ing the surf­ing would as well. It’s been great to see things shift away from the big cor­po­ra­tion and the WCT and back onto some of the artists and crafts­men who most of the surf­ing com­mu­nity can iden­tify with. There are a huge num­ber of peo­ple doing some really great things in the surf world.

What is in your cur­rent quiver? What is your favorite board?
Right now, I’m surf­ing a 9’6 Almond Log Rhythm. It’s nar­row and thick, like the boards they were surf­ing back in the early 60’s.  I’ve been really enjoy­ing it. Because of the thick­ness, it gets into waves easy and early; but because of the nar­row tem­plate, it feels lively. It side slips right where you want it in the wave. I’ve also been surf­ing a 5’10 Kookumber a bunch lately, and hav­ing a blast on that. I like the early entry and smooth lines for a board that small. I want to surf a 5’6 version.

What’s your favorite meal?
Seafood. I really like fish and shrimp and most every­thing that falls under that category.

What are you cur­rently lis­ten­ing to on your iPod?
Mason Jennings is at the top of my list right now. Ray Barbee too. The per­for­mance that Ray Barbee and the Mattson 2 put on for the pre­mier of the Present was phenomenal.

What’s next for Dave Allee?
I’m not exactly sure. Plenty of excit­ing things I hope. We’ve still been con­tin­u­ing to grow and expand with all the dif­fer­ent facets of Almond. It still feels like we haven’t even come close to reach­ing our poten­tial. So, with that in mind, I just want to con­tinue to have fun with all of the Almond stuff, and see where it takes us. I’m hop­ing to visit Australia at some point in the next year too. We’ll see, there are so many pos­si­bil­i­ties for the future.

More infor­ma­tion about Dave Allee, his boards and his shop can be found here.
Principal pho­tog­ra­phy by Cam Oden. Bottom photo by Kyle Lightner.