The Mission To Build A More Sustainable Surfboard And Share It With The World

When it comes to commitment, Ryan Harris has been all in on the pursuit of building a more sustainable surfboard for a long time. Whittling away his days in his Los Angeles shaping bay, from the blanks and resins he uses, to his Zero Waste Initiative, to growing his own platform to share his ideas and thoughts, the man’s dedicated to innovation.

“I thought nobody was going to listen to me on my platform because all I do is make surfboards, but that’s when Selema [Masekela] said, ‘That’s why you're wrong, dude. You’re black and you’re a shaper. There’s like, none of you, so people are especially gonna listen to you,’” Harris explains. “All of a sudden, I felt like I had a voice. I shared some stories and more black surfers started reaching out. I just started getting this fire.”

A man on a mission, Ryan has recently teamed up with the AltaSea project in L.A. to put his efforts in front of a broader audience. Situated at the Port of Los Angeles, the AltaSea campus has been created to be an incubator for the Blue Economy—accelerating sustainable, ocean-inspired solutions to the challenges currently facing the planet, including climate change, energy supply and food security. And over the last year Ryan’s been building his dream sustainable surfboard facility there, the new Eco Board studio.

Looking the share the hard work and vision with folks, coming up on Saturday, February 24, AltaSea is hosting an event called “Riding Waves of Change with Leaders in Surf Sustainability.” Ryan will be anchoring the gathering as he illuminates the audience with the magic of his sustainable surfboard innovations. Joining him will be Haley Jain Haggerstone, the Partnerships Director at Sustainable Surf and SeaTrees, as well as journalist and documentary filmmaker Angela Sun, who directed and executive produced the documentary “Plastic Paradise: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.”

If you find yourself in the L.A. area and keen to learn how some folks are making the world a better place, click here for tickets and more information.