It first started at “the spot”— a vacant tennis court in Syracuse’s Eastwood neighborhood. Skateboarding crews brought in ramps and rails until it became one of the few places where the culture was able to thrive without rejection from community residents.

Now, Syracuse skateboarders have Better Skate Shop — a storefront in the heart of downtown that has played a part in reviving the local scene. Better opened in January after its four owners held fundraisers at the tennis court turned DIY-skate-park and now sells its own apparel, as well as big name skateboard brands like Huf. The shop also features work by local artists and hosts concerts.

Up until five years ago, skateboarding in Syracuse was largely a thing of the past. In the 1990s, the city was a destination for professional skateboarders — some even hailing from Canada — until it fizzled out in the early 2000s, said Ian DaRin, a co-owner of Better.

DaRin, a senior industrial design major, said at first the city and Syracuse Police Department didn’t respond well when skateboarders moved in on the tennis court. They were told by many community members that they couldn’t use the space to skate, he said.

“We were like, ‘No one’s using it except for that crackhead over there,’” DaRin said. “‘If anything, we’re trying to make this place better.’”

Since then, “the spot” has become a registered city park, DaRin said. This, in part with the shop’s opening, has made Syracuse’s skateboarding scene more accepted by the community, as well as by skateboarders who used to be sectioned off into unfriendly cliques.

“The culture has become better because now people know everybody in the scene,” DaRin said. “Us attaching our faces to that — they look to us for what the next thing will be.”

The shop attracts a loyal crowd that includes high school students from the suburbs, Syracuse University students who ride down from the hill and residents who support all forms of the city’s artistic subculture, said Drew Shoup, also a co-owner of the shop.

Within the last year, the city has begun to reclaim its former title as one of the most popular locations to skate in the Rust Belt, said Julius Harpending, another co-owner of Better. The Everson Museum of Art is known as an “East Coast skate mecca” and, these days, there’s little tension between skateboarders and police officers, he said.

“It’s a city full of places to ride your skateboard with a relatively low chance of getting busted out of there or yelled at,” Harpending said.

Much of the shop’s aesthetic and artwork reflect the fresh, yet gritty youthfulness of the city’s skate culture. DaRin and Noah Hausknecht, also a co-owner of the shop and recent SU alumnus, used exposed wood and found materials to decorate the shop, such as the dressing room, which is made out of two reclaimed doors welded together with a metal bar. The total cost of designing the store was around $50.

“It was kind of a combination of design slash we didn’t have money to do anything else, so what can we do to make it look awesome with just the materials that we have,” Shoup said. “Everything in it, one of us built with our own hands.”

The shop’s homegrown, family mentality is something that the owners hope to continue for further generations, Harpending said. Similar to when he was a kid spending days “chilling and getting Gatorade” for skate shop owners in Ithaca, he wants young skaters in Syracuse to be able to skate freely and feel welcome at Better.

“I think I wanted to create that same thing here,” Harpending said. “We’re not trying to compete with people, we’re just trying to keep the scene flowing.”

Published on April 27, 2015 at 10:32 pm

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