09/18/2026
HAPPY ALOHA FRIDAY!! 🤙 🌼 🌺
This is Tyler Hatzakian, founder of Tyler Surfboards. Shortly before leaving California 22 years ago, I fell under the spell of his amazing surfboards. Tyler is a few years (maybe 4 or 5) younger than me, but essentially my age. He learned the craft of surfboard building under the tutelage of one of the finest surfboard craftsmen of the 1960s, Hap Jacobs (Jacobs Surfboards). As such, Tyler’s boards are one-of-a-kind masterpieces. His attention to detail are second to none and his unique designs are like no other longboard available in the world.
He is the central figure in one of the most unusual surf films ever made, Single Fin Yellow. We see Tyler build a board, then we follow that board around the world, as it is sent to 6 different surfers around the world who try it out in local waves. It is a beautiful, artful film. I went to the premier screening of it!
There is a huge demand for his boards. To get one is to wait months, years sometimes. I went to the shop a year before I left. His wife, Catherine explained to me that most of his boards were being sent to Japan, were collectors/surfers snapped them up at premium prices. The Japanese are rabid consumers of American culture. Tyler’s “old school” surfboards are highly sought after. In a stroke of luck, the day after I left the factory, Catherine called and said that a guy had traded in his 10’ Craftsman Noserider the next morning when he picked up his new board. Since I was the last dejected surfer who had been there, she called me first. Did I want it? You betcha! I drove to the shop near LAX as soon as school let out to pick it up!
Even though I never met Tyler directly, for a few years I rode one of his personalized creations under my feet. I bought it with me to South Carolina and sold it while going through my divide. I still miss that board! 🏄♂️
https://youtu.be/Bl3lv3B6dl8?is=ls1RC2tpvpRxMRQX
https://youtu.be/U_Myjm1uIgQ?is=1FhZwJAO7n5P8B9N
