A Marina del Rey Prodigy Turned Pro at Fourteen A single deck shape, patented in 1985, is still marketed today by retailers as "the shape made famous by Christian Hosoi." That kind of staying power says something about how vert skating's most flamboyant star built his reputation during the 1980s boom — not only through …

Turning Down the Big Companies: 1977 At nineteen, Tony Alva had already done enough to skate for whichever company he wanted. Instead, in 1977, he walked away from the sport's established brands and started his own. Alva Skates became, in the words of the Los Angeles Times' 2007 profile of Alva, the vehicle that made …