Kelly's Covers: A Pictorial History
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Magazine covers can offer a wonderful history lesson for those who care to look. Cover images are always state-of-the-art, and, when viewed in a timeline, they provide snapshots of surfing's ongoing evolution: in performance, in photography, and even fashion.
In the course of his career, Kelly Slater has gone from New School upstart in the early 90's to handsome (and hirsute) portrait subject around the turn of the century to New Age design wizard in the late noughties. He's been the driver of the trends and the most visible face of surfing for two decades. He's also sold a truckload of mags. Here are all the ones I could find arranged in (roughly) chronological order.
Comments
Thankyou for finally getting rid of the budgie smuggler cover.
You're gonna miss those gonads, Fitzy.
I would like to heartily second Fitzroy's comment.
Stu, thanks for the walk down memory lane. They were the days, eh? When too much usage of the word 'gnarly' was barely enough, and subbies created headlines like "I went to Mexico to surf but got shot in the head instead".
Loved it all.
And it reinforced how freakish RKS has been and for so long!
Nice work. 3 bucks for a surf mag, complete with articles titled "Pauline Menczer - is she a bush pig?". That brought back memories of seeing her going over the falls like a rag doll at big Margies...Classic. (Sorry...I know it's about Slater).