Bespoke Snowboard Wrap

THE CLIENT

The client for this project was a very familiar face: Creative Solutions employee—and snowboard enthusiast—Pete Coller.

THE BRIEF

With a well-earned skiing holiday on the horizon, Creative Solutions staff member, Pete, was looking to refurbish one of his old snowboards. Rather than spending a small fortune on a brand new board, he felt an existing one could be freshened up with a unique, custom-made vinyl wrap, for a fraction of the cost.

While structurally sound, Pete’s current board was showing signs of age. Scuffs, scratches, discolouration; everything you might expect from years of heavy use. The existing design of the board felt dated, too, so it was certainly time for a fresh new look.

For the design itself, an image was chosen from Shutterstock. Pete wanted something that would look incongruous and out-of-place on a snowboard. Old wood, rusty metal. There was even the idea to use a giant plaster!

As with any full-colour custom print, the design possibilities are endless. We can use photographs, patterns, a child's drawing, a cartoon. Whatever you can dream up, we can print it.

Creative Solutions has plenty of experience with sports equipment similar to this; over the years our design team have wrapped their fair share of canoes, kayaks, paddleboards and, as you might remember form a recent case study, the odd bobsleigh.

THE SOLUTION

Firstly, the bindings and old stickers were removed and the snowboard was cleaned ready for application. Any repairs to cracks, or chips around the board’s edges, were not carried out in this case, at the request of the client.

As shown in the photographs above, the final design choice was a rusty metal effect, purchased from Shutterstock. From there, the design team took the selected image, resized it for an optimal fit, and full-colour printed it onto MD5A blockout with matte laminate. Other options are available for this type of wrap. As well as gloss, it is possible for us to implement a scuff-resistant finish for more robust use.

The rusty metal graphic was then applied to the board and trimmed to the edge to allow for the bindings to be re-fitted via pre-drilled holes.

This is certainly an economical option. The price for application is relatively low as there is minimal material usage: Pete’s snowboard board consists of just 1650x400mm of MD5A-B.

The likely turnaround for a project such as this— from artwork approval to finished product—is around 3-5 working days.