Skip Frye

Skip Frye's San Diego shaping history reaches back to 1963. His own biography traces his work at Gordon & Smith, including a named model introduced in 1966 and the wing mark associated with his boards. It describes the Egg evolving from an experiment in cutting down a V-bottom into a round tail, alongside fin experiments including the New-E-Free and the Finger, conceived with Ricky Ryan.

After returning to Gordon & Smith in 1981, Frye left for Diamond Glassing in 1986 and shaped under the Skip Frye Surfboards name. In 1988, he and Donna Frye opened a shaping room and office attached to Windansea Surf Shop in Pacific Beach. A 1983 San Diego Reader profile also documents the relationship between his custom shaping and testing designs through his own surfing.