Tinkering with Laurie Towner

In between his product design and development role with needessentials, Laurie Towner is always tinkering away at creative projects. Whether he’s making his fishing lures, spearguns or timber Alaia surfboards, Laurie is always engaged in an ongoing process to make things that are best designed and cater for his own needs. In this short film, Laurie takes us through the process of shaping, glassing and sanding a 4’11 x 20” x 2 ½” swallow tail with hand-crafted marine ply keels. This little self-shape formed part of the quiver Laurie took with the family when they traveled around Australia on a trip of a lifetime that was captured in the feature film Slow Lane.

‘After mainly shaping timber boards over the years I thought I’d record having a go at making a fun board that’d go really fast in head-height waves then show how it surfed. It’s basically a little flat, disky groveler. It was fun going through the whole end-to-end process of recording the process of shaping a blank, making marine ply keels then glassing and sanding at home. I guessed if I shaped some sort of board with foam it'd work, and if I was lucky, go fast, and it kind of did!’’

Click here to watch the full Laurie Towner 'Slow Lane' feature surf film that was released in July 2022. It follows big wave surfer Laurie Towner and his family as they travel on a dream road trip exploring the vast Australian coastline in search of waves, good fishing and adventures.

This film produced by needessentials and edited by Ishka Folkwell not only showcases Laurie Towner's surfing but also gives you an in-depth understanding of Laurie as a surfer and father. The film explores the concept of passing on knowledge to the next generation through shared experiences and good times spent together as a family.

Cinematographer Nathan Henshaw's beautiful images capture the stunning landscape of the Australian continent and its wide variety of waves and wildlife as the family make their way from coast to coast. With an original soundtrack featuring Headland, Nick Bampton and Maanyung and additional music by Mick Turner and Musgrave Band, this film is a portrait of a young family on a simple adventure.

View full 'Slow Lane' feature film here.