“I’m pretty fulfilled with my life of surfing; I’ve done it for as long as I can remember and I’ve been the luckiest person in the world. Now, it feels like I’ve been taken out of one life and put into a new one, it’s a completely different experience,’ explains 61-year-old surfer and shaper, Stuart D’Arcy.
D’Arcy is speaking to me over the phone while sitting on the patio of his home situated near the rural village of Bonalbo, where he and his wife Michelle aim to live organically off the land. The nearest pub is 30 minutes away; the closest supermarket is more than double that distance and it takes three hours to drive to the Gold Coast, where the couple was previously based.
‘The countryside is beautiful; the people here are amazing. There are only five cars in our valley and it’s 23,000 acres,” enthuses D’Arcy. “I wake up in the morning to the sound of the birds and I can hear the kangaroo grunting on the lawn. It’s such a big difference to the noises of the shaping bay. You can even shower outside in the nude, because from our house you cannot see anyone. People come to the countryside for relief, we get that feeling 24/7.”
Most surfers cannot fathom a life away from the beach. The sea is the drug that fuels our addiction and we need to be minutes away from that next hit at all times. The fact Stuart lives a world away from the coast is also surprising given that he continues to shape boards on the Gold Coast, for his loyal customers.
“I restrict myself to custom boards. Once every two weeks I go to the Gold Coast to shape. My diary hasn’t changed much, I still shape the same amount of boards each year. There are fewer and fewer younger guys coming my way but that is expected. I’ve been trying to retire for the last five years but I can’t let my customers down. If I’ve shaped you one board, I won’t let you down if you’d like another.”
“My sense of fulfilment has made it easier to move out to the country but if the surf is good I’ll just drive three hours and go surf. It’s not that bad. When I worked in Japan, people based in the shops in central Japan would drive six hours to go surf, that really puts it into perspective.”
Originally from Cronulla and born into an English and Irish family, D’Arcy started surfing as an eight-year-old and competed throughout his childhood, eventually following the trials of a colourful, 80s pro tour that prized beach crowds over classic waves. He began “dabbling” in making surfboards at 14 when he worked part time for a shipwright who taught him how to use fiberglass and resin.
He met Michelle in Melbourne in 1986 and moved to Torquay in 1987 where he started shaping at Strapper Surfboards. However, a drip-feed of orders eventually prompted a return to his old stomping ground.
“While at Strapper, there would be limited work in the winter, so in 1991 we moved back to Cronulla and I started my own brand: SDG. Martin Potter asked me to make him some boards that year, so I made three and he loved them. Jim Lucas, who was the owner of Force Nine, suggested we start Pottz Surfboards and so we did that until 1996. The problem I found with Pottz Surfboards was that the shops never paid, we were doing all this work but weren’t always getting paid. The same thing happened when I started Vudu, which was also involved in wakeboarding and snowboarding. I became really disillusioned with our partners and I thought why should I supply shops that don’t pay? This led to me starting D’Arcy Surfboards in 1998 and moving to the Gold Coast in 2000.”
Since starting D’Arcy Surfboards in 2000, Stuart has only offered custom surfboards and believes the direct relationship between the shaper and the customer is what makes the art of surfboard building special.
“It’s a craft, a therapy. It’s not about me; it’s about me and the customer. I’ve always strived to use the best materials I can get and utilise the best craftsmanship available. The people I work with now on the Gold Coast have made my move inland so easy. My friends on the coast is what allows me to be here, they make it so easy because I can trust them to produce quality and if you ask anyone I’ve worked with, they know I’m a narc when it comes to quality.
“When I come to the Gold Coast I work out of Marty Allen’s shaping bay. Woody Jack cuts my blanks and Hammo Surfboards acts as the glassing factory.”
“I’ve always been proud of what I can make with my hands and then to see someone get on it, ride it and say it’s the best thing ever is an amazing feeling. It’s like growing something, you eat it, it’s delicious and it fills your appetite. It’s similar to a surfboard.”
D’Arcy and Michelle purchased the property near Bonalbo a couple of years ago but have been living permanently in the country for just shy of a year. As the couple became disillusioned with life on the Gold Coast there was also a growing desire to live more self-sufficiently, which prompted the move inland.
Stuart describes Michelle as the ‘goddess of organic’.
“In the 37 years we’ve been together, we’ve always been alternative. We’re just more health conscious through natural ways. When we first came out here, Mich spotted close to 70 plants and weeds on the property, which were nutritious and had medicinal benefits. Straight away, we saw how we could be at home on the land. We had a feeling that we belonged here.”
“We haven’t purchased fruit and veg for ages. We’re pretty much fully sustainable. We’re close to buying a milking cow, we have 20 more chickens coming and we source our meat locally from the farmers. We also swap our fruit and veg with our friends out here.”
During the couple’s time on the Gold Coast, they lived in a house in Currumbin. D’Arcy explains that in their early years on the coast you could wake up and not hear a car and drive into town in two minutes. However, he believes the Gold Coast has become “too congested with polluted minds of greed and angriness”.
“I’m not taking anything away from my friends who still live there and have their idyllic lifestyle. But for us, health and wellbeing through nature has always been a priority.
“The Goldy has slowly changed due to entrepreneurship which made it cool to come to the Gold Coast. Originally it was affordable to come here and young people moved here and they were keen to open cafes and restaurants and start businesses. People here were living for the moment, they put all their money into something and were serving locals. At the same time, the locals were open and friendly to people from out of state coming here. It slowly grew, but when things start to get nice and cool, all of a sudden everyone wants a bit of it. Opportunity arises and it became a developer’s dream. Once the council sees the money they can make, they ride the backs of young people who put everything on the line to try and make something nice in the place they live but then get pushed out when the developers come in and price everyone out of everything.
“Everything just got too much. A drive to Surfers Paradise would take 30 to 40 minutes and now it takes the same time to get from Cooly to Burleigh.”
D’Arcy also believes that surfing has changed and not for the better.
‘It’s been a long time since I surfed, but I’m almost ready to get back out there. But nowadays there is such a different attitude and expectation in the water. Everyone thinks surfing owes them something. When we were younger you would go surfing purely for the love it, there was no pressure to do it. It became a want and a need through addiction, it had nothing to do with performance. But now it seems that you have to go surfing, parents drag their kids to the ocean, make them train and tell them what they have to do and then they hit 15 and they quit because they’re scared and there’s too much pressure which has been put on them.
“When you’re young, play and be young, enjoy yourself. See and do as much as you can because you’ve got a whole life ahead of you to work when you can no longer do all that young stuff.”
Despite his disenchantment with the Gold Coast’s evolution, D’Arcy hasn’t lost his love of shaping and plans to keep driving down the hill to make boards for as long as he can.”
“I’ve never had a retirement plan. I always thought I’d shape until I drop and not because of the money, but for the shaping part.”
