Surfboards. What’s not to love? As an avid surfer, I’ve developed quite the collection of boards, especially in the last few years. A couple of customs from shapers I love. A few off the rack, including one excellent asym from Ashton Pickle, aka Ah Vessels. Multiple scores from OfferUp, including an unsigned fish from Ryan Burch that was an absolute steal.
Living in San Diego and traveling often, they all get a good rotation depending on the conditions or the destination. Eventually, the issue became storing them when not in use which, to be honest, is a nice problem to have. The fix came when I discovered LISS racks.
Here’s the thing about a good quiver: it deserves to be treated like one. Whether that means having a nice rack (or three) for storage, day bags for the daily surf checks, and the right board bag for travel, protecting them goes a long way. Part of the reason that I justify having nice boards is that I take care of them but that’s a lesson I learned the hard way. A few of my early boards became so waterlogged from dings that went unfixed that they essentially became worthless. Nowadays, I’ll fix them with some SolarRez, or take them to Ding King for serious repairs, but the main thing is just being careful with them. A proper rack is one of those things that pays itself back ten times over.
That’s where LISS racks have come in huge. The brand — short for Living In Sunshine — makes two racks: the Spirit Rack for vertical storage and the Sun Rack for horizontal storage. Both hold up to four boards and are made from 100% eco-friendly materials — bamboo and cork — are designed to look good wherever they live, whether that’s the garage, the office, or the living room.They also include built-in storage for accessories, which is rarer than it sounds in the surf-rack market. Bonus points: the Spirit Rack assembles in under ten minutes with no tools.
The Spirit Rack is the vertical option, and its built-in storage drawer is a low-key game-changer if you’re forever tearing your house apart looking for your fins, sunscreen, or bar of wax. Mick Fanning once said the key to scoring is to be prepared and organized because we all know just how fickle the ocean can be. Throw your wax, sunscreen, extra fins, wax combs, and fin keys in the drawer, and the next time you head out for a session you’ll waste no time getting everything you need.
LISS
The Sun Rack is the horizontal option, built for a big wall — ideal for keeping longer boards (logs, mid-lengths, guns) in a garage or storage room without low-ceiling headaches. It also features a drop-down storage element — smaller than the Spirit Rack’s drawer but still plenty of space for accessories. And if you’ve got a big place and a quiver worth showing off, the Sun Rack does double duty as a piece of functional wall art that turns your boards into the decor.
A lot of the racks on the market with five-board capacity run around $500. The LISS racks come in at about half that price for four-board capacity, which puts them in a sweet spot that’s actually justifiable for someone who isn’t trying to outfit a surf shop.
What sets LISS apart, beyond the design, is the story behind it. The racks were designed by two brothers who are equal parts passionate about surfing and serious about craftsmanship. They didn’t farm out the engineering — they prototyped the racks themselves, iteration after iteration, until they had something they’d actually want in their own homes.
“We knew that creating the perfect rack would take time, so we devoted ourselves full-time to LISS,” they say. “Based on what we’ve learned through years of woodworking experience, we crafted prototype after prototype until we were satisfied. From the drawer to the interlocking pieces, we wanted a rack that was equal parts functional and beautiful.”
The serious DIYers out there will scoff. Fair enough — you could build one yourself with a hardware store run and a few hours in the garage. But unless you’re genuinely good with wood, the finished product is probably going to look like a garage rack. Which is fine if that’s all you want. Keep your older yellow boards on the homemade rack in the garage and your primo customs on the LISS rack in the living room. Best of both worlds.
A good quiver deserves a good home. If you’ve been stacking, leaning, and praying your boards make it through the year without unnecessary damage, do yourself the favor. Head over to their site to grab one or join their community on Instagram to stay in the loop on new products — like the new hammock that looks insane.
Related: Living In Sunshine Delivers Function & Craftsmanship With New Surfboard Racks