About A Board

From their artisan workshop in South Devon, arry Robinson and Alen van Rooyen shape English cedar surfboards with a stylish, retro edge.

- Anna Turns

There’s a gentle offshore wind blowing across Bigbury Bay towards Burgh Island, and Harry Robinson and Alen van Rooyen are eyeing up Bantham’s neat, three-foot waves. It’s 10am, the tide is dropping, and the morning rush hour of surfers has been and gone. Harry and Alen prep their sleek, handcrafted wooden surfboards with locally made beeswax then head into the Devon surf and let the rip tide carry them out back, ready to ride the waves. ‘Last autumn, we had a dreamy day surfing at Bantham,’ recalls Alen, who takes to the sea with his business partner, Harry, at least once a week. ‘When we arrived, it was foggy and starting to rain. We paddled out, expecting hordes of surfers to turn up, but we had the place to ourselves for a good couple of hours. It was an amazing time.’

Surfing touches every part of Harry and Alen’s lives now, because a year ago the two pals co-founded Lignum Surf, an innovative board-making business based on the Devon coast. In a workshop just a mile away from Bantham, they design and craft wooden surfboards, paddle boards, body boards and skateboards. So far, they’ve made 15 boards from English cedar. ‘There’s really nothing better than the feeling you get catching the very first wave on a surfboard you have spent days crafting yourself,’ remarks Alen.

Both men feel a deep connection to the sea and their shared interest in sustainability stems from that. As a keen surfer, diver and kitesurfer, Harry explains that ‘part of our ethos is to leave the ocean how we found it – the sea has some hard times ahead due to plastics in the wrong place’. This important issue led Harry to make his first balsa-cored surfboard during a surf trip to Ecuador. When he returned to Devon two years ago, he found that his friend Alen was making wooden canoes and boards alongside his work restoring classic wooden boats, and an idea for a business took seed.