About the Gotham Surf Club

The Gotham Surf Club started in 1998, approximately one year after Alex Karinsky started his grounbreaking NYC surfing TV show “NYC WIPEOUT!”. The TV show was a huge success that led to many parties & film premieres hosted by “NYC WIPEOUT!” that eventually rolled in to the Gotham Surf Club. Due to an overwhelming amount of requests from the viewership to meet up and to share information, tips, rides & to actually meet in person, parties & gatherings started off in a monthly pattern and was usually hosted at the venue VOID, which was owned by Allison Culbertson and Eric Savage, NYC’s first video lounge.

Through the years up to the present day, the GSC continued its commitment to the NYC surf community by holding many film/video premieres & parties. Some of these events included bringing Jack McCoy to NYC for the first time to premiere his masterpiece“Blue Horizon”, Taylor Steele with his phenomenal work of “Campaign 2”, Andrew Kidman’s “Glass Love” and in another year his movie “Litmus”. Some superb films such as James Fulbright’s “Miles To Surf” and Brian Conley’s “My Eyes Won’t Dry” were also premiered by the GSC. In addition we also provided a stage for local talent to have their work shown in an international arena of NYC, such as Luke Thorpe’s “East Side Theory”.

While back in the late 90’s when the GSC started up, Alex’s concept was to have a ‘club’ environment in such that it would somewhat resemble a ‘board riders club’ as they exist in Australia. These are clubs that people join for a fee, get free gear and would meet once a month to have a ‘surf-off’. This is where the members would compete amongst each other to select who would represent the club when throwing down the gauntlet/challenge to other local beaches for bragging rights. But with so much flux that NYC enjoys, it was hard to establish a consistent membership basis and to continually track the whereabouts of members. But to also be fair, there are too many NYC distractions along with the fact that we all know how fickle conditions can be in NYC. So the concept of a subscription based membership went out the window.

Fast forward to today, and GSC|NYC is less about a club and more aligned with the exemplary lifestyle of a surfer amongst the urban blight of a mega metropolis. Hence GSC|NYC is seeking avenues of expression for its lifestyle brand by providing cool & unique fashion designs for leisure time and business wear. As more opportunities present themselves, we will inherit these to provide as further levels of the lifestyle brand. As stated before, NYC is a creature of flux and forever evolving, this too we hope will be the impetus and game plan for GSC|NYC to evolve, invent & express ourselves and our unique lifestyle to the world.