Photos by Aidan White
Who are we?
Woolstores Forever is run by a group of local, national, and international skateboarders who all share a passion for The Woolstores and its significance to both the local community and international skateboarding history. We are all volunteers.
Our committee and advisors include experts from diverse backgrounds: architects, historians, lawyers, councillors, and heritage specialists who have been coming forward since the start of the campaign to offer their services.
What is our goal?
Our campaign will promote Western Australia's oldest and most famous skateboarding spot: The Woolstores.
We aim to celebrate the significance of the site and highlight the long lasting benefits it continues to provide.
The end of this site would be a great loss to both Fremantle and the international skateboarding community.
Our goal is for Woolstores’ current function as a hub for skateboarding, socialising, and creativity to be embraced in the impending redevelopment. We welcome the new developers and believe the inclusion of our thriving community will be a great asset to the project. Much of the site can change but there are some key parts that must remain as they are in order for the spot to remain significant to skateboarding.
Through in depth community consultation and a co-design process, the skateboarding community can add volumes to the much anticipated revitalisation of The Woolstores building and the wider Cantonment Street area.
The presence of skateboarding in the urban landscape has been proven to enhance shared spaces in redevelopment projects across the world (some examples here). The Woolstores should be no exception.
Why is The Woolstores so special?
There are many reasons people from all over the world visit the Woolstores.
The Ledge
Running along the eastern face of the building is a low metal capped ledge spanning a hundred metres, broken into four long sections. The ledge was created to protect the wall from incoming trucks receiving shipments of wool from the building, meaning it had to be robust. Because of this, it has withstood nearly 40 years of skateboards grinding along it without a single dent. The height and width of this ledge, combined with the slick metal edge and smooth ground creates near perfect conditions for skateboarders to perform “grinds”. There are many other ledges of similar composition around the world, but very few can compare to the 100m length of the Woolstores.
Examples of how skateboarders use The Woolstores (Tognelli, 2024)
““Perfect ledges, shade and smooth ground. What else do you need?” - Eric Koston, professional skateboarder.
“perfect place to hang all day.” - Sean Malto, professional skateboarder.
From Acclaim Mag’s “Top Ten Skate Spots in Australia, According to the Oakley Skate Team”
The length of the ledge is what allows skateboarders to perform “lines” (multiple tricks in a row) this allows for an uninterrupted period of flow and expression while interacting with the ledge. It is for this reason that professional skateboarders from around the world travel to the Woolstores to make their video projects complete.
The Legacy
Over time The Woolstores has been featured in so many international videos and magazines that people will now visit just to appreciate the history.
Skaters can measure themselves up against the iconic tricks that have gone down, marvel at how they were pulled off, and have a chance at meeting some of the world's best skaters there just by chance.
Many of Australia’s best up and coming skateboarders were raised at this spot including the likes of Shaun Paul and Sean Parker to name a few, both recently making their debuts in the international skateboarding scene.
Show any skateboarder in the world a photo of the Woolstores, they will recognise it and likely tell you they have dreamed of skating there.
The Atmosphere
It is not only skaters who frequent the building. On any given day at the Woolstores it is likely you will see a modelling shoot, music video, photographer or street artist expressing their creativity amongst the skaters. It is not uncommon that you see wedding photoshoots there too. This creates a melting pot of creativity and talent, allowing skaters and other creatives to meet and collaborate. Creatives are drawn here by the excitement and life brought about by the skaters, as well as the aesthetics of the building and its years of street art.
Mural by acclaimed local artist Drew Straker
Wedding photography by Nicolle Versteeg
Installation by acclaimed local artist Sam Bloor
Skaters play table tennis for GMTA skateboards photo by Alex Aitken
The Location
In addition to the ledge itself, the building provides crucial shade in the afternoon that is complemented by the breeze known as The Fremantle Doctor, this allows skaters to spend all afternoon there without overheating. In contrast, there is not a single skatepark in the Perth Metropolitan Area that provides shade, because of this skaters will travel across suburbs for this unique spot rather than staying at their local skateparks, thus creating a space for like minded people to meet and make new connections. This is further facilitated by the building’s central and easily accessible location.
Skateboarders at the Woolstores used to promote Fremantle tourism on a billboard
Why can’t a street spot be replaced by a skatepark?
Skateboarding was conceived long before skateparks. Born in the 1960s as surfers looked to the urban environment to express themselves, empty pools and steep hills were reimagined into concrete waves. Throughout the 1980s, skateboarders ventured further into the streets and began to modify their boards accordingly. This brought about what we know today as “street skateboarding”. Skateboarders look at otherwise innocuous objects in the urban environment to interact and document themselves skateboarding in new creative ways. As this progressed, the emphasis on documentation through photos and film became the backbone of the scene. Skateboarding has steadily grown to a thriving multi-billion dollar industry, as skate film and photography creates excellent opportunities for brands to organically market themselves through clothing, shoes, and other equipment worn in videos and photos.
Skateparks and competitions developed in parallel with this but by no means define what skateboarding is. It may surprise a layperson that, more often than not, a well paid professional skateboarder will seldom participate in high level competition, rather making their fortune and fame through being videoed and photographed while traveling the world to find and skate various creative street spots.
The combined physical and creative challenge of interacting with the built environment through the use of a skateboard is at the core of what makes street skateboarding so alluring to undertake, and so intriguing to watch.
“Skateboarding structures the world view of those who practice it. Despite itself, it engenders a reevaluation of spaces and materials otherwise taken for granted. Who, aside from an artist like Ed Rusha, would be interested in an empty parking lot”
Raphael Zarka, The Forbidden Conjunction, 2011
Skateparks are purpose built for skateboarding and cordon off skaters from the rest of the community. Although they are excellent for exercise and practice, skate parks will always inherently lack the creative allure of the wider urban environment. It may be interesting to note that for this reason professional skate videos and photographs very rarely include skateparks. In the instances when they do, on closer inspection you will see that these are either concrete ramps built by skaters in abandoned areas, or very obscure uses of the skatepark in ways they were not designed to be skated.
A simple analogy is that a skatepark is to a street spot as a paint by numbers book is to a blank canvas.
As more and more professional skaters visit The Woolstores, the boundaries of what can be done on a skateboard continue to be pushed to levels beyond what was previously thought possible. So far, over 30 years of progression has been consistently documented there, what will come next?
Some scholarly articles on skateboarding and architecture can be found here and here
