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Name: Surfing Heritage Centre
Location: The Pumphouse, Dairy Beach, Durban Beachfront
Use: Musuem, retail, cafe, tourism office.
SA Surfing Heritage(s) gain momentum
06/10/10 By Paul Botha
It’s all but official. The country’s first Surfing Heritage Centre will be established on the Durban beachfront following a tender process which awarded ‘preferred tenant’ status for the Pumphouse Building at Dairy Beach to Surfing Heritage South Africa (SHSA). The objection period ended last week, and the members of the non-profit SHSA are now negotiating the lease for the building with eThekwini Municipality. Surfing Heritage have already embarked on a fund raising initiative.
The conveniently positioned centre is set to become the headquarters of surfing in Durban with the building incorporating a Visitors’ Centre, which will house a collection of surfing memorabilia and cultural artifacts, a surfing themed café, a retail store selling core surfing products, change rooms, toilets and storage space for members and the admin offices of KwaZulu-Natal Surfriders Association.
Formed early in 2009 with a board of directors that encompasses long standing surfers, industry personnel and administrators based countrywide and internationally, SHSA is a section 21 company dedicated to preserving, presenting and promoting South Africa's surfing history, heritage and development for the appreciation and education of current and future generations.
Spearheaded by champion big-wave surfer John Whittle and based on the Surfing Heritage Foundation in California founded by Dick Metz, SHSA has already assembled a sizeable collection of historical artifacts including surfboards, magazines, journalism, photographs, posters and the like.
Building on the collection purchased from Baron Stander’s Timewarp Museum, John has sourced and curated a fascinating body of work, much of which can now be found on the website www.surfingheritage.co.za .
By procuring premises on the Durban beachfront, this collection will become accessible to an even broader range of people including the current surfing community, the general public and visitors to Durban. It will also create a surfing hub around the City’s most important surf spot.
The SHSA is not confined to Durban with the Cape Town based founding members and others harnessing the immense interest in the Surfer’s Corner Sixties Reunion that drew over 500 veteran surfers to a function held in March this year. Plans have been drawn up for a Surfer’s Walk of Fame at Muizenberg, where the first recorded waves were surfed in 1919, and premises for a Surfing Heritage Centre are being sought.
And it is hoped that similar efforts will be made for SHSA representation in the Eastern Cape where the rich history of Jeffreys Bay, the country’s surfing Mecca, and other iconic surfing venues can be documented and displayed for the benefit of current and future generations.
For further information on the activities of SHSA visit the website where you can sign up for the newsletter and contribute items of interest or to the fundraising drive, or simply join the Facebook page Surfing Heritage South Africa to keep up to date on breaking news.
http://www.zigzag.co.za/news/enviro/6779/SA-Surfing-Heritage(s)-gain-momentum
Location: The Pumphouse, Dairy Beach, Durban Beachfront
Use: Musuem, retail, cafe, tourism office.
SA Surfing Heritage(s) gain momentum
06/10/10 By Paul Botha
It’s all but official. The country’s first Surfing Heritage Centre will be established on the Durban beachfront following a tender process which awarded ‘preferred tenant’ status for the Pumphouse Building at Dairy Beach to Surfing Heritage South Africa (SHSA). The objection period ended last week, and the members of the non-profit SHSA are now negotiating the lease for the building with eThekwini Municipality. Surfing Heritage have already embarked on a fund raising initiative.
The conveniently positioned centre is set to become the headquarters of surfing in Durban with the building incorporating a Visitors’ Centre, which will house a collection of surfing memorabilia and cultural artifacts, a surfing themed café, a retail store selling core surfing products, change rooms, toilets and storage space for members and the admin offices of KwaZulu-Natal Surfriders Association.
Formed early in 2009 with a board of directors that encompasses long standing surfers, industry personnel and administrators based countrywide and internationally, SHSA is a section 21 company dedicated to preserving, presenting and promoting South Africa's surfing history, heritage and development for the appreciation and education of current and future generations.
Spearheaded by champion big-wave surfer John Whittle and based on the Surfing Heritage Foundation in California founded by Dick Metz, SHSA has already assembled a sizeable collection of historical artifacts including surfboards, magazines, journalism, photographs, posters and the like.
Building on the collection purchased from Baron Stander’s Timewarp Museum, John has sourced and curated a fascinating body of work, much of which can now be found on the website www.surfingheritage.co.za .
By procuring premises on the Durban beachfront, this collection will become accessible to an even broader range of people including the current surfing community, the general public and visitors to Durban. It will also create a surfing hub around the City’s most important surf spot.
The SHSA is not confined to Durban with the Cape Town based founding members and others harnessing the immense interest in the Surfer’s Corner Sixties Reunion that drew over 500 veteran surfers to a function held in March this year. Plans have been drawn up for a Surfer’s Walk of Fame at Muizenberg, where the first recorded waves were surfed in 1919, and premises for a Surfing Heritage Centre are being sought.
And it is hoped that similar efforts will be made for SHSA representation in the Eastern Cape where the rich history of Jeffreys Bay, the country’s surfing Mecca, and other iconic surfing venues can be documented and displayed for the benefit of current and future generations.
For further information on the activities of SHSA visit the website where you can sign up for the newsletter and contribute items of interest or to the fundraising drive, or simply join the Facebook page Surfing Heritage South Africa to keep up to date on breaking news.
http://www.zigzag.co.za/news/enviro/6779/SA-Surfing-Heritage(s)-gain-momentum