Skating, Street Style, and Urban Community

The resurrection of brooklyn’s skate scene

Imagine a summer afternoon in New York: spilled ice cream cones, buses hissing as they pull up to stops, dogs barking from behind fences. The heat’s crawled up to 80 degrees, but the Brooklyn Banks is still bustling with skaters. Most of them are in their late teens to early twenties, styling graphic tees, baggy pants, and Vans as their wheels hit the black pavement. Effortlessly cool and indifferent to the hordes of tourists, the skaters sit cross-legged on the pavement or stand against the chain-link fence, taking turns doing kickflips off the half pipe.

What defines a “skater?” The term is usually associated with a laid-back, cool persona, someone who wears baggy clothes and is into indie music. Someone like Mateus Jones may come to mind. He’s 18, a freshman at LaGuardia College, and has been skating for six years. He and my sister have been close friends for most of their lives. They met in kindergarten, and spent their elementary school years playing handball against the garage door and sneaking peanut butter cookies into French class. Mateus has lived in Brooklyn for the past three years, and most of his friends are involved in the skate scene. “The skating community in Brooklyn is very welcoming. Everyone in New York is out and about, so it’s super easy to meet and run into people,” Mateus says, “And it’s easy to get around with public transportation, I take the metro every day.”

Mateus’s skating isn’t just limited to Brooklyn, though. “When we’re trying to shoot a brand video, we’ll go to a skate park, usually the McCarren in Brooklyn. But I usually take the train into the city, Tompkins Square in the East Village is a good skate spot,” Mateus says. “What about the Banks?” I ask him, trying to sound familiar with the local skate scene (but probably coming across as a tourist). “I’ve been to the Banks a couple times since it reopened, but it’s not my go-to spot,” Mateus responds. The Brooklyn Bridge is colossal, towering 277 feet, the drab concrete streaked with neon tags. In 1990s New York, most skateboarding hotspots were liminal, transient: construction sites, alleys, abandoned warehouses. However, the Banks stood out as a central hub for both skateboarding and graffiti art, frequented by artists like Keith Haring. Although the Banks closed for renovations in 2010, it reopened in 2023, thanks to Tony Hawk and his non-profit, The Skatepark Foundation, which helped secure its place as an official skateboarding site.

A California native, Mateus’s love for skateboarding began in Long Beach, where he lives part-time. When asked to compare the skate scenes in Long Beach to Brooklyn, Mateus says that Brooklyn takes the cake. “It’s harder to get around in SoCal. Also, I’ve only lived in New York for three years, and I haven’t seen most of it,” he says. While Long Beach may not have the prettiest stretch of coastline in SoCal, the ocean views obstructed by port ships and oil islands, there’s a bike lane along the water that’s popular with skaters. Kids will skateboard down steep streets off PCH or hop the fence to Rogers Middle School on weekends. My sister and I grew up penny-boarding in the flat neighborhoods off Retro Row, styling Paul Frank helmets and Justice sweatshirts.

Even as a kid, Mateus was cooler than we’ll ever be. For him, skating is more about community than competition. “When I was younger, I wanted to be a professional. But now it’s more about having fun. I’d say my skating form is very relaxed. I look like I’m about to fall at any given moment,” Mateus says jokingly, “don’t get me wrong, though. It’s nice when a brand reaches out for a collab. Who doesn’t appreciate free clothes?” Mateus’s personal style consists mostly of baggy jeans, oversized graphic tees, and Vans, and his skateboard is from a New York-based brand called Frog. Mateus co-owns a brand called Playlist with his friends, which sells shirts, hand-sewn bracelets, and crochet keychains. He also works with a brand called Calm, which sells hats, hoodies, and other streetwear items. “One of my favorite memories was when we shot a video for Calm in Times Square. We shot around one in the morning, because that’s when the police aren’t around to chase after you,” Mateus says.

With a population of nine million, New York has come to be associated with feelings of isolation and loneliness, the small fish in a big sea phenomenon. Early 20th-century philosopher Georg Simmel even generalized city livers as cold and unfriendly. I don’t skate, and my knowledge of skate culture was sparse prior to writing this article. My experiences in New York are even limited: getting drunk on aperol spritzes in Little Italy, eating Minute Maid frozen lemonade in Washington Square Park, looking for the cellist who busks Chelsea Market on Wednesdays. However, having lived in cities for most of my life, I know that we seek the balance between anonymity and connection, that a sense of community is hard to find. When you’re young, community is something you’re placed into; kids are tied together by navy blue uniforms and Disney Channel shows. But as you grow older, you have to seek it out for yourself. Brooklyn’s skate scene challenges the assumption that community is lost in cities like New York. “I’m lucky to have met a good group of guys through skating,” Mateus says, “the people I’ve met in Brooklyn are like a second family to me.”

After talking to Mateus, I started to reflect on the question: what is urban community? Is it merely a string of shared experiences with friends—window shopping in SoHo, sipping overpriced coffee, taking the subway from point A to point B? Or is it a sense of belonging, knowing you’re part of something bigger? Over the years, my communities have changed—the coffee shops I’ve worked at, the clubs I’ve joined, the people I’ve lived with. When your life is in a constant state of motion, you wish you could pinpoint “your people.” I think I’ve yet to find my second family, as Mateus puts it. We all have to find our Brooklyn.

Words: Agnes Moser Volland

Photos: Luke Jensen

Design: Dorothy Wang