Coast Creations with the Phillips Family

Dario Phillips is the present-day version of the 1970s characters that inspired this season. Not only does his life revolve around skate and surf, he’s built a career on a love for the subcultures that emerged forty years ago in The Golden State. Originally from Vancouver, where he worked on the skate publication, Color, he’s created content for WHAT YOUTH and is currently turning towels — a.k.a “beach canvases” — into a new medium for art through his brand, Slowtide.

Known primarily as a surfing resource with a music aspect, Dario integrated a lot more skateboarding content into WHAT YOUTH, noting a fluidity of these topics as part of a bigger cultural shift. “Kids in general now are surfing in the morning, skating in the afternoon, and snowboarding on weekends; and it’s acceptable to have an interest in all three. There used to be more of a separation between surfers as jocks and skaters as the cool kids.”

Reflecting this inclusivity, Dario co-founded Slowtide to make highly-desirable artists and photographers more accessible. The solution: bring them to the beach! “There are paintings that sell for thousands of dollars, but we can take that same art and showcase it on a towel — an object that people are taking out with them every day.”

Like true West-Coasters, Dario, Laura, and Bowie (1) name both Long Beach, California and Canada’s surf capital, Tofino as home. If not driving the boards and BBQ down to San Onofre Beach, the family spends weekends at nearby Cherry Park, where we tagged along for an afternoon of sun and skate.