The boards that makes it to your local shop are just the icing on the cake. The real fun happens a few iterations back, somewhere on an undisclosed mountain with your favorite riders. In the case of Salomon Snowboards, this experimental process, also known as prototyping, is quintessential to the refined board design that we’ve grown to love.
The design concepts specific to their Hillside Snowboard Project Series were presumably hard to find, let alone integrate later on. Luckily, Salomon Snowboards is blessed with a shaping connoisseur by the name of Wolle Nyvelt. His expertise, coupled with the riding of Josh Dirksen, Victor Daviet, and Max Buri, allowed for some serious insights (both on and off the board) to go down. One of the biggest takeaways being:
“Not all snow is created equal; powder in the Cascades is very different from powder in Niseko. Some people want to turn, others want to spin off a natural feature. This is the concept behind the Hillside Project—different boards for different terrain, snow, and riding styles”.
Wolle took this into consideration and manifested a truly ATV piece of wood. Enjoy these clips of Josh, Victor, and Max as they do Salomon, and frankly everyone watching, a public service experimenting on your soon-to-be favorite freeride board.
Featuring: Josh Dirksen, Victor Daviet, and Max Buri
Filmed by: David Vladyka
“With decades of powder riding and a profound expertise in shaping boards, Wolle Nyvelt has developed a refined process for creating prototypes, utilizing rider feedback and focusing on craftsmanship using the finest materials. The Hillside Project Series is a continuous pursuit in the development of authentic powder shapes, designed to reflect diversity in terrain, snow, and riding style. This is our vision of powder riding.” – US
Photography by Perly
