Sweet, Home!

Skateboarding, as many people know, was invented by surfers looking for a way to keep surfing when the ocean was calm – and it took off all over the nation’s largely landlocked interior. “I guess you could surf on the Ohio,” jokes Derek Metten, co-owner of Home Skate Shop on Bardstown Road, adding, “There’s wakesurfing behind boats ... ”

Metten and fellow Home Skate owner Thom Hornung met about 20 years ago as coworkers at a now defunct skateboarding shop on Preston owned by Hornung’s mother. The two bought Home Skate from its original owner in 2003, but didn’t move it too far from its original Baxter Avenue location. Earlier this year, the pair bought the house next door to the building they occupied at 1547 Bardstown Road, after the new owner tripled the rent on the storefront. “We looked at some places, but it’s just where we wanted to be,” Hornung says. Adds Metten, “I just always liked Bardstown Road. We like the neighborhood and the community and you can’t beat the foot traffic.”

Skateboarders aren’t the only ones who beat a path to Home Skate. Despite the name, the duo sells more than boards to riders. Clothes, magazines and wheels (skateboard components, including bearings and axles – ”trucks” – are sold separately) are available for purchase, and the wall of colorful shoes is impossible to miss. “It’s nothing but skateboarding shoes, but we sell them to people who just like the shoes,” says Metten. “It’s like how basketball shoes became in the ‘80s for people who didn’t play basketball. People just liked them.”

Besides having everything you’d need to get mobile – including advice – the shop hosts demos each summer, featuring professional skateboarding teams from across the nation. “Creatures [a skateboard company] and Vans [skateboard shoe pioneers] came through this year,” Hornung says. “They come and sign autographs, then go to the park and skate with the kids.”

Skateboarding culture was alive and well before the construction of Downtown’s Extreme Skate Park, and especially beyond. “Street skating is definitely the most popular form of skateboarding now,” Metten says. “There are parking lots, like the Valvoline lot at Eastern Parkway and Bardstown Road. Sundays are the big day.” Even in bad weather, Hornung knows where to look. “You can find a good parking garage or something,” he says. “That’s what we would do when we were younger.”

Neither Hornung nor Metten feel that age is necessarily a limitation for anyone who wants to get on a board, whether for the first time or after a decades-long break. Says Metten, “A lot of people buy longboards now. They’re about the size of a snowboard and a lot more stable. You can also get softer wheels, which will get you from point A to point B, as opposed to the common skateboard, which is more to do tricks on. We call them cruiser wheels.” And Metten sees almost all ages come through the door. “Kids skate because their parents are doing it. Some of the kids have been skating since they were two years old.”

Or even younger. Nick Dawson, whose son, Indy, turns two in January, is already a skateboarding veteran, rolling alongside his dad on a board. “Home Skate Shop has been around in one form or another since my first summer on a board [in 1987],” says Dawson, who skates with the Concretins, a self-described “group of older skaters.” He says of the shop, “It’s skater-owned and -operated, as it should be for any shop, and the best thing is, you could easily be skating with the owners at your next session.”

“I don’t plan on ever stopping skateboarding,” says Hornung, who met his wife when he lived in San Diego where she worked for Transworld Skateboarding magazine. “I mean, you should probably be able to walk first, but no, you’re never too old.”

Home Skate Shop’s new location is at 1553 Bardstown Road. They’re open seven days a week and can be reached at (502) 456-6911. They’re also online at www.homeskateshop.com.

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