Push: Chris Collins

Interview by Tom Pickard

Photography by Toby Shaw

Let’s start with the normal stuff first, please.

My name's Chris Collins, I’m 33 and I live in Harrietsham, a tiny village in Kent between Maidstone and Ashford.

So you’re 33 now, but how old were you when you first started skating?

I was 11. I remember the first time I ever saw a skateboarder. There was one skater in the village and I saw him do a fucking mean powerslide and his shirt was flailing in the wind, and it was just wicked. I kind of knew from then that it was what I wanted to do. After that, my nan got me a board. I was always an energetic kid, I rode bikes and had other hobbies, so skating was another fun thing to do. When I was 15, I filmed for a video with my brother Matt and a few pals, which I think five people saw and then the footage got deleted. After that, I think I just kind of ended up being a bit of a skatepark rat, you know? Once you have to pay bills and stuff, I had to get a job, and I just ended up in the skatepark skating because it made me happy.

Which notable Kent skaters were around during that era?

It was back in the day when Lovenskate were still based in Kent, so they were holding a lot of the comps, and there were quite a few really rad skaters around. I always remember the Casual Skateboarding lot, which was a little Maidstone brand. Kris Rogers was definitely one that I used to watch quite a lot because he was a local rail chomper; he was incredible. I grew up skating with Harry Lintell; we went to school together in Ashford, we got quite close. We had a really good scene in Kent, there were a lot of unknown rippers. Andy Thorpe was definitely one of the best skateboarders to come out of Ashford. He's got two kids now and is living the life, but he was and still is incredible.

Battle in East Sussex is named after, and contains the site of, the Battle of Hastings. It's also where, 958 years later, Chris found and conquered this no-margin-for-error 5050.

What has your relationship with skating been like between then to now?

To be honest, my relationship with skating changed. Between the ages of 23 to 28, I was working, partying, girlfriends... You know the story. I would only go and skate the park to make sure I could still do some tricks because it was good for me; it was an escape, and no one could take that away from me. In hindsight, this is when I needed skateboarding the most. I was also dealing with a lot of built up frustration around some of the skateboarding scene at the time.

So what was it that made you get back into skating again?

I kind of realised that I'd wasted a lot of time and I was getting older. Then the tragedy of Ben Raemers dying by suicide, this affected Harry quite a bit, and made me realise how out of touch we had become. The message around that time was, ‘tell your friends you love them’, so I made contact and went up and skated with him in Manchester, and that was when the fire was re-lit. I went street skating with him and it just showed me what I should have been doing the whole time, you know. After that, I couldn't stop thinking about it and it pushed me to go out and start skating street again. To go from a small scene in Kent to a place like Manchester, which has got such a banging scene and everyone's so good, it was humbling, and it made me think, ‘don't ever think that you've peaked, you can keep pushing this, don't ever think you're too old because people are still doing this’. It made me push myself again.

And how is the Kent scene these days?

Folkestone is getting quite big and quite tight because of F51; I skate there quite regularly. I know that's a skatepark, but it's more of a social thing that creates connections to other scenes in Kent. There are lots of little pockets of scenes in Kent that all have their own things going on, and it's nice to connect with everyone. I generally like searching for spots all over Kent because there are spots, but people just don’t realise.

Unsuspecting Horsham steel falls victim to Chris' ongoing Debris handrail assualt. All black backside lipslide.

You’re filming quite a lot at the moment, tell us about that please.

So I’ve been filming for the last year and a half with Tom Pickard from The Source. He's been making a video focusing on local spots and how cruddy they are. So yeah, the video's called Debris and it’s coming out later this year. I’m really looking forward to getting some stuff out for that. Tom messaged me and just asked if I wanted to be a part of his next video, which I was stoked about, so yeah, that got me really hyped.

Up until then, did you know anything about the Hastings skate scene, or The Source?

I knew a bit about the skate scene, but it was always a bit overshadowed by the BMX scene. I don’t think it was until Source Skate Co. was started that I did start keeping an eye on what was going on in Hastings. Then after going to the Jumble Sale premiere, it was very evident that Tom was trying to do a really good thing, trying to push the scene, pushing the youngsters into filming, getting them out on the streets with their pals. It was really refreshing to see someone trying to reinstate some of those qualities and traditions into the young skaters again.

Stop Chris, this is too much! So what skaters are you filming alongside for the video?

There's a young lad Sam Allison from Brighton, he's a little ripper, and then there's Brighton's finest, Al Hodgson. We've got Sonny Wright from Hastings, he's a wicked dude, still running the same wheels as the last video, also Sid (Prestedge) and Mike (Nicolls) from Hastings too. Oh, and Matt Ransom! It’s a wicked crew.

After skating parks for so long, how did it feel skating street again?

I mean, doing it at this age, my body’s definitely feeling it a lot more, but yeah, I just had to get my head around the frustration of dealing with the elements of a spot, you know - the traffic, the cracks in the pavement, a brick that might not be lined up right, any little thing poses an issue to such a simple trick that you can do in a skatepark. So yeah, it’s definitely brought its challenges, but to be honest, being in a skatepark is the last place I want to be right now.

Outside of skating, what do you do for work?

I build skateparks for Fearless Ramps. I've been doing that for about three years now. That's another reason why spending time in skateparks is kind of the least of my priorities right now, because I spend all day in them anyway.

Chris chases down his rogue Iguanodon acqaintance with a Southwater town centre backside 5050.

With the influx of amazing skateparks popping up everywhere, what do you see happening to street skating?

It's kind of hard for kids to leave the park now, because they have everything they need. It's so easy to get stuck at the skatepark, but now that the options are so endless, it's like people are almost getting overwhelmed. So people are getting put back out in the streets and I think people are realising what skateboarding is actually about a bit more.

What kind of street spots does the South East have to offer?

In Kent it's hard. We have a lack of intermediate spots, it's either a pretty gnarly stair set or handrail that no one's ever done before, or it's a tiny spot, which is kind of underwhelming, but if you look closer, they are really interesting spots that require a little bit more thinking and creativity.

How come you're so confident on rails?

I think I loved rails very early on; a lot of my local sort of influences were rail chompers. I loved the idea of just getting on a rail and balancing. Let's be honest, to skate rails, you just need to have a really confident ollie and know that you can land on that rail in the right place, and if you're going fast enough, you're going to make it to the bottom. I just didn't want to have to flip my board and deal with rolled ankles all the time, I could just go fast and jump on a rail... I just found my comfort zone there. It's almost like a safety net. People say it’s crazy when I say that, but I'd much rather skate a big rail than try and kickflip a 10 stair.

Fair play! Cheers Chris. Have you any last words, or thanks?

Thank you to you, for hitting me up that time, otherwise we wouldn't be getting anything done. Shout out to all the boys at F51, Luke at Hivemind Skateboards, he's helped me out a lot in the last year with products, and obviously The Source.

Follow Chris - @chris_kermit_collins