by Lily Plume and Reka Borcz

Paul Duvignau

Big Wave Surfer and Shaper

Think of any kind of surfboard imaginable, Paul Duvignau has probably either surfed it or shaped it. He was pushed into his first waves by his father at the early age of two, his competitive career began before he reached his teens, and by the time he turned 14 years old he was already carving out a career in shaping. After spending his childhood competing in shortboarding, he then switched to longboarding, attracted to the more laid-back spirit of the classic style, and went on to win second place at the French Longboarding Championships. Oh, and he also competed in the Tandem Surfing World Championships in 2018. Now, the 23-year-old Hossegor local splits his time between the waves and his workshop, charging big waves in Les Landes, shaping boards and building wooden creations for Vissla.

We caught up with this French waterman during one of his escape trips to Imsouane, where he comes to escape his work schedule and kick back for a daily routine of surf, eat, sleep, repeat at Olo. He shares with us his shaping process, his big wave mindset and the stories behind his projects. Read on for an insight into the creative life of Paul Duvignau, big wave surfer, shaper and all-round maker.

So Paul, where did it all start for you?

I started to surf when I was 2 years old, with my dad. He pushed me into the little waves, after seeing him surfing I would always be like, “Papa, Papa, me! Now, it’s me!” Then I started surfing on my own at 6, I joined a surf club, trained a little bit more, did a few contests when I was between 10 and 15. Then I started to shape, aged 14, and I switched at the same to longboarding.

Why did you make the change to longboarding?

I thought the longboard spirit was better than with shortboarding. I found that shortboarding was too much like contest and aggressive surfing, and I liked the more relaxed spirit of surfing that came with longboarding. I actually ended up doing a lot of contests, being part of the French team, competing in the French Championships, and my best result was second place in the French Longboarding Championships. And then I felt like the spirit was going super bad again, I was feeling the same as I did with shortboarding a few years ago so I decided to stop longboard contests. At the same time I was also doing tandem surfing and surf tandem contests because I felt like the spirit was better.

What is surf tandem?

Surf tandem is when you surf with a girl doing lifts. The people who do it are more like a family because there's only 20 teams in the world. We ended up 4th at the 2018 World Championship in France with my partner, Alice, we were super happy. Now we aren’t doing it so much because you have to train a lot for surf tandem and now I’m working a lot it’s hard to work and train at the same time.

How did you start shaping?

I started shaping just for fun when I was younger, I was doing more boards for friends than customers back then. I’d been traveling a lot and I studied shaping when I was 13 by making alaia boards, wooden boards, and actually I didn’t plan anything for the future. It was just for fun, because I wanted to do stuff, that’s it. And one day a friend told me: ‘Hey Paul, you’re shaping alaias, if you want I have a blank for you that I can sell to you for 30 bucks.’ I was like, why not, maybe… I didn’t say anything to my parents, because they actually didn’t want me to use the chemical materials for shaping. I was 15 at the time, and I wanted to start longboarding and shaping more boards not just alaia. An old shaper I know who is a true inspiration for me, he was kind of the legend from Hossegor, I asked him to make me a longboard and to teach me how to shape, because I had this blank and I wanted to replicate the shortboard I had. So he shaped my longboard and I watched him doing it, and then we did my shortboard replica.

That’s how it started. Then I went into the cellar of a friend’s house and we started making boards just for fun, and then I moved my stuff to a tent in my garden, then I went to another workshop with my dad’s friend who was actually a shaper, and he taught me how to laminate boards better. Then I moved to another workshop with Shaper.fr who actually sold all the materials for making boards. I worked at their place for a year and a half. Then I moved for 3 years to the workshop of a guy called Antoine. He was such a good laminator, so he taught me how to perfectly laminate boards. After those 3 years I broke my shoulder while snowboarding, had nothing to do and no money, so I couldn’t take any workshops because the rent was too expensive. So I decided to renovate the caravan in my garden into a workshop, Vissla saw that and they offered me the job.

What exactly do you do for Vissla?

I design furniture and logos for them and at the same time I’m still working as a freelance shaper, making boards for my own customers. I’m also an ambassador for Vissla, and I renovate caravans. They saw the first one I did on Instagram and I ended up doing a shaping caravan for them, which we now bring to events and sometimes we shape inside and everybody can watch us work. When I was working in a van in my parents’ garden, Vissla asked me to do more work for them, so I told them how about we can rent a big place so we share the rent? Now I’m super lucky because I have a big workshop where I can also live in too.

So you live in your workshop?

Yeah, that’s why I escape sometimes to come here, because when I open the door of my house I’m in my workshop so I’m never out of my cycle of work, but I’m passionate about my work so.. It’s so good actually because I have all my boards, all my stuff, all my cars and everything I need is there in the same place so I don’t need to move. Sometimes I just don’t move for 3 or 4 days, because I just don’t need to go anywhere! But that’s also why I escape sometimes and it’s good to come in Imsouane so I can just surf and escape work.

When did you start coming to Morocco?

I went to Morocco for the first time when I was 10 years old, it was the first trip of my life. I was visiting my grandparents because they bought an apartment next to Casablanca. It wasn’t a surf trip, but I met some Moroccan guys who surfed. Then a few years ago, Nathan (Sadoun) told me about this place, Imsouane. Last November 2018, I visited Nathan in Marseille, when he’d just got back from Morocco and I saw a video and all his posts on Instagram and I was like, ‘Okay, maybe I will go too…’ Then January came around, it was super cold in France, and I was working on my caravan in the garden doing a few things for Vissla. I was walking my dog on the beach and a friend told me he was going to Morocco next week, the flight was 60 bucks, I was like, 60 bucks? That’s so cheap! Then I bumped into my dad’s friend who told me he’s just back from Morocco… Everyone was going and not me! So I went back to Nathan and I was like, ‘What’s that place you told me about again…’ And that’s when he told me about Olo and straight away he called Hamid. So I bought the ticket and came here.

How was your first trip here in Imsouane?

When I arrived, it was sunny, perfect waves and actually for the first time in my life I felt like I was on a holiday! I was staying in the main house here, where you have breakfast, then you go surf, you come back, you have lunch, you go surf again, you come back, you have dinner, you sleep and you repeat it for like one week! We travelled a little bit with a guy to the other spots and I was just so happy on this trip that I really wanted to come back, but I had work, I have a dog, and Vissla wanted to work with me more in the workshop... But a few weeks ago I came back from a trip in Indonesia and I was feeling super bad home, it was super cold and I had no work to do, and I was texting Nathan about coming out here… And here we are again! So I try to come whenever I can, because it’s so cheap to get to, and I feel at home here, everyone welcomes me super warmly every time I come.

What was the road trip you did with your little Renault?

I went up north from Hossegor to Brittany with my Renault 4L, the famous car you can see here in Morocco a lot. I went with my friend who is a filmmaker, we went up north one year and then the year after we made a little movie of the trip. Then we went east to visit Nathan in Marseille, and went on to Italy through Switzerland and back, so now we plan to go to the South. And for sure, Morocco is south! So maybe that’s the plan for next year. We’re gonna come with a, because I have 6 cars like that and one of them is old and rusty, because in France it costs a lot to repair so maybe next year I’ll come with the car and repair it in Morocco. Whilst I leave the car in a garage to repair, I’ll come to Olo, rest for a few days and then I’ll pick up the car again and hit the road south to Dakhla… we’ll see!

Can you tell us about your shaping process - what mindset are you in and how do you get there?

I play music super loud when I shape and especially when I laminate the board. When I laminate, I love to play the album of The Doors called ‘An American Prayer’, because I know the song so well that each moment of the song fits each step of the process, so for example, I know which part of the song is good to do the resin so it’s not gonna catalyst too fast, or at this part of the song I have to do this or I remember that… But for shaping I like to play all kinds of music it just depends on the shape. I have to say, I do half hand-shaped and half preshaped, so I’m also using the machine. It depends, some customers like hand-shaped so they just want me to do something, and other people will ask me for more specific stuff like, ‘35 liters, a round nose a bit like that…’, so then I just do it on the computer, which is actually easier for them to be sure of what they want. It’s not the same though, I don’t have the same mind when I do hand-shaped and machine-shaped. I prefer hand-shaped, like the board I have here, the 7’6, the very thick one, the one I made before going to Indonesia with my dad. With that I was just like: ‘Okay I’m gonna make something’ and I made it and it works - that’s the best feeling ever.

What was in your head when you shaped that board?

I wanted to make something with a lot of volume which paddles fast, which is actually also good for Morocco, because you have long points and you have to paddle fast. I have a lot of volume in the front with rails that are super angled and a concave deck, so your centre of gravity is lower, and you’re more stable on the board, rather than if you have a dome deck. And the tail is really thin so it allows you to put the rail in the water super easy. And the fins, it’s a quad, so I put 2 S-wings fins, those weird fins I have which allow you to turn faster. They’re shaped like the tail of a fish so the fins are very flexible, so when you turn they flex and then come back to the shape, which pushes you to go faster. I had the best surf in my life in Morocco yesterday on that board. It was like 1 metre 50, a big wall all the way from the peak for 200 meters… my legs were burning! So when I shape a board I try to think about when I’m gonna surf it. That’s why I don’t understand people who shape that are not good surfers. I don’t mean to say I’m a good surfer, but I mean people that don’t know what they are doing. I see shapers that are shaping guns and they never surf waves bigger than 1 meter. So how can you shape a gun if you don’t know how it reacts in big waves, as you don’t surf big waves? Like myself, I’m very bad at shaping logs like Nathan or Lahcen’s boards. I do performance longboarding and so I know how to surf on a performance longboard but with logs, I’m trying a little bit more with them now, because I understand a bit more and I tried some boards but I still have to improve myself.

What have you shaped for big waves?

I shaped a gun for surfing Belharra, a big wave in France. I kept thinking about the shape for so long, and I went there with another board to see how it was to try to understand what I needed there, then I went into the shaping bay and I knew what I wanted to do. Something I can face the big bumps in the water, something that can paddle fast, that has a lot of rocker that won’t go into a bump... I did the same with angled rails and a concave deck because the board is very thick so if you’re on top of it, you’re gonna roll on the side because of the bumps, and for in a concave you’re in it. Your centre is lower so you’re more stable for paddling. So when you want to shape a board, you have to go into the shaping bay and think when am I gonna surf this board? How is it gonna react to the waves I want to surf? Sometimes it works well and sometimes not at all. Sometimes I make a big mistake and then I surf the board and I’m like,’Whoa this is awesome!’ It’s like a happy mistake. I have a twinny that I made the tail so thin I thought I made it too thin, and I went surfing with it and actually that’s the best board I’ve ever had. The best shortboard, it can carve so well, the rails just hold in the wave so it’s so good. I thought it was a mistake but it actually works better than the normal rail. So that’s it. When I’m in my workshop I just play music super loud because it helps me to put my mind in another place, I just don’t think about anything else.

How do you get in the zone for actually surfing big waves, how do you stay calm?

I’m always super excited, but big waves make me feel calm because I know I’m nothing facing big waves. The power of nature is way stronger than you so you cannot do anything, if you still go super excited it’s super bad because maybe you can die. Because it’s something you can’t joke about it. The first time I went big wave surfing I was 10. My dad brought me along and I was so scared because he told me what not to do, and I actually did exactly that... I ended up crying and I didn’t want to surf with him again. I went back to big waves at the age of 14. Step by step, just with a 7’6 gun, and I started to go again and again. By the age of 15, I had a 9’6 because I shaped a 10 foot gun for my dad, and he gave me his 9’6 gun. I met three friends who were a bit older than me and they were surfing big waves and with that kind of surf, when you see your friends doing it, you wanna do it too. After I turned 19 I was competing in the Challenge La Nord, the big wave contest in Hossegor that my dad created for big wave riders. It’s a local big wave surf contest, that is actually nothing compared to the big wave contests like Jaws and Nazare, but anyway it’s a local contest. I surfed the board I shaped for my dad, and I won the contest. It was a shame though because I wasn’t there at the prize giving - I had to drive to Bordeaux to catch a flight to Hawaii - and my dad called me and told me I won the contest. I had actually made the trophy for the prize giving, so in the end I made it for myself!

How is big wave surfing different to normal surfing?

After winning the contest, I realized the reason I love big wave surfing is because there’s a lot of respect between each other. That’s something you don’t have with normal surfers in Hossegor because many people come for the surf so it’s like a contest - free surfing is actually a competition in Hossegor. With big waves, everyone is scared about the wave so you just have to be calm and respect each other. Since last year, we train with a group of 8 friends in a swimming pool training in dynamic apnea with a coach, so the goal is to swim super fast and we’re doing breathing exercises at the same time. It helps you to be more calm and confident when you’re in the water, because when the big wave comes to you, you just have to breathe normally and go, and you know you can do it because you already do it in the swimming pool. Big wave surfing is just in your head. You just have to stay calm and never panic. It’s been a few years that I’ve been surfing big waves but it’s still hard to explain. It’s something you’re scared of but you want to go anyway. Something that you hate but you love at the same time. It’s like waking up at 5am, going to swimming pool training, and you hate to swim but you have to do it. I hate swimming and people sometimes ask me why I wake up at 5am to go to the swimming pool, it’s cold outside because it’s winter... But it’s worth it, because for example the morning I arrived here, a guy tells me, ‘Hey you’ve got to wake up at 5am tomorrow morning, we’re going surfing the big left!’ And I just don’t mind because I know what waking up at 5am and facing danger in the morning is like, I’m just used to it. That’s the thing you have to train for, it’s all in your mind. And for the body, I have a pretty physical job, I don’t sit in front of a computer all day long, so it keeps me fit. But really, there’s no better training for surfing than surfing.

What do you think was your biggest wave so far?

The biggest wave was in Belharra, last December. I’d just got back from the Mediterranean road trip and I hadn’t trained in the swimming pool, I was shaking, I wasn’t sure of myself, I didn’t know what to do. I was scared but at the same time I wanted to go. I went, and I was a bit sick on the boat, I paddled out and actually I was feeling so good in the water, not scared at all. Belharra is so huge, you see the wave coming from super far away towards you like the size of a building, and you’re so scared of it but at the same time you want it because that’s what you’re here for. I remember I was sitting on the board and I saw the guy on the jetski already towing-in two guys on the wave, but the wave was coming towards me and I saw the guys paddling for it but it was like, now or never. Because Belharra is so huge, you’re in the middle of the ocean, you don’t have any landmarks to see where you are. So if you’re at the right place there’s just one chance to do it. So I was facing the wave, at the last moment I decided to turn and paddle for it, and I saw my friend who was on the wave and he did the bottom turn and let me go. When I passed him I jumped - you can see in the photo that I have all the fins out - then BOOM I landed on the water again and all I thought about on that take off was my shape work, I don’t remember anything about the wave. All I remember is like ‘Oh god, what the f**k!’ The wave was huge but I didn’t fall - actually on this day I didn’t get any waves on my head. I mean, my hair was still dry.

Any hectic wipeouts?

I have to say that I’ve never had a big wipeout on a big wave, because I always try to be careful. That’s also one thing that shows, I’m not taking many risks. I could take more risks, to go deeper or catch bigger waves, but I’d rather stay calm and not take any risks. Something I see a lot is people getting huge wipeouts because they take a lot of risks and I think it’s a bit stupid because you can really injure yourself, getting waves that big on your head.

What are your future projects or trips?

Actually now that I have had the workshop for a year I’m more quiet, staying at home more. I used to travel a lot during winter when I was still studying at school, but now that I have the dog and the workshop and I work for Vissla, I just stay home more. So the plan is that when I can I escape to Morocco, but I have to work for the first 6 months of this year, working more on wooden stuff for Vissla because it’s the worst time for surfing in France, so not many boards to repair or to make. Soon it’s the opening season of all the shops in town, so I make all the stuff they need like new logos, new tables, etc… And also I have some caravans to renovate for customers, I have one to do when I go back home for a girl who wants to make a vegan meals food truck. I love it because I always have to learn new things, like I’ll have to learn how to do the kitchen which I’ve never built before. Then I’ll start making boards again in the summer, and eventually back to Morocco!

Sneak peek into Paul Duvignau's life