It was a cold afternoon in September when we sat down with Liam at Perth Skatepark, a few weeks after the chaos of Perth Skate Jam. Perth Skate Jam took place on the last weekend of August at Perth Skate Park. One of our favourite events on the Perth calendar.
What was the first Skate Jam that you remember attending?
Liam Dargie: I remember attending in…
*shouting from the side of the skate park* Harris Grant: 1985?!
Liam Dargie: Haha! Nah, I remember attending when I was 13 or 14. It must’ve been around 2006, I’d literally only been skating for about 2 weeks.
Did you compete?
I did! It was when we were all very energetic young kids, and we all entered as a group to see who was the best.
How has the event changed since then?
The ethos of the event has always been the same – just have fun with your friends, enjoy the summer, and just go out. The weather will be pretty sour from now on until winter’s done. But the ethos has always been there: just get everyone together and have fun.
How did you come about organising the event?
I think it was about 2015 when I first started getting involved. It seemed like a good opportunity. Before that, it was pretty much run by Glen [Wood] on his own. I just thought it would be a good idea to get my hands dirty because this is a place that gave me a lot.
Have you changed anything since you started? Or has it all pretty much just stayed the same?
We just wanted to make it a bit more grouped. It used to only be ‘16 and under’, then everyone else; that was it. Now we’ve expanded to four main groups… 13 and under, 17 and under, women and non-binary jam, and then 18 plus. Anyone can enter as long as they feel comfortable in that category. It’s not the most perfect way to run it, but it works.
Have you been to skate jams in other places? How do they compare to here?
I’ll always be biased and say ours is the best because I am so involved in it. Everyone runs it a different way. They’re all the same though. Everyone comes together for some fun, and some people win stuff, and hopefully, nobody goes away with any injuries.
And the Perth & Dundee jams fall on the same weekend…
Yeah, I’m not sure how that ever came to be. But as long as I remember, it’s always been the same. Dundee’s always been on a Saturday and Perth’s always been on a Sunday, the last weekend of August. Ever since I can remember, since back in 2006 – it’s a tradition at this point.
How did the pandemic affect the event over the last couple of years?
We didn’t do an official Jam in 2020 due to massive event restrictions and paranoia of getting fined for throwing events. So that’s the only year outside of weather-based cancellations where there hasn’t been a jam.
In the past 20 years, there have been two that haven’t gone on. One was because it rained so much, and the other was because of the pandemic. We threw one in 2021, but we were just being cautious about anyone getting COVID from it, and I don’t think anyone did, which is pretty good. I think we ran a pretty safe event.
What was it like trying to organise the 20th skate jam? It’s a big event, so there must have been lots of pressure…
I think that was the problem; I think I gave myself lots of pressure.
Basically, we started shooting ideas as soon as the 2021 jam was over, just to see how big we could make it. I wanted to try collaborating with industries and titans to try to get guest boards and that, but production costs and running it out of my own pocket… It’s a bit hard to do that. It’s super expensive for someone on a minimum-wage job to run!
But no, I think the 20th year for what the vision was versus what happened, I think we nailed it pretty well, you know. Everyone on the day was good. We had an after-party; it’s the first year we’ve had a designated evening plan for the day. It was at The Ballroom in Perth. We had a massive night of pool and drinks; it was pretty enjoyable.
So you’d say the day went well?
It was great! The sun was shining fantastically somehow; the forecast was miserable. We had 20 degrees of sun, no shade, lots of fun, lots of beverages and lots of banter.
What about the painting?
The tradition goes that the biggest ramp in the skatepark – known as ‘the vert’ – gets painted every year with a different design. Again, keeping the tradition alive is the whole point. It used to be that we’d just paint it one colour, but over the years we’ve got more intricate with different designs. There’s been graffiti designs or just a whole lot of paint with some absolute crackers. Everyone respects it; it’s one of the few ramps that usually doesn’t get spray painted. It’s great that everyone universally respects the art that gets painted.
This year we painted about half the skatepark, which is quite ambitious. We had a cracking team of manual labourers, haha. We racked up a sizable bill, which we managed to cover. So hopefully it stays like this, and we’ll continue it every year.
Can we have a breakdown of the winners and runners-up?
So in the female & non-binary category, we had nine different entrants, which was great. The female and marginalised areas are growing each year, and this is only the third time we’ve had the category – the first year there were only three entrants. Nine’s pretty good. In the top three, we have Cathy from Edinburgh, Lola from Dundee, and Emily from Inverness.
We had 18 in the ‘13 and under’ jam. They came from far and wide. People from local, throughout the Central Belt, and as far as Inverness. Top three here we had Fraser from Stirling, Zac Moffat, who’s a boy from Perth, and Emily who won the ‘women & non-binary’ jam and also won the under thirteen jam. A wee double win for the day!
‘17 and under’ jam we had 20 folk, again another great turnout. The youth are ever-inspiring. In third place, we had Katie, and Angus from Aberdeenshire, and first place was Josh.
‘18 plus’ jam, we had forty entrants, which is insane – I mean, I suppose it’s because we’re all old, haha! We had eight groups of five, then one or two went through for each group. That then boiled down to joint third place, which was Jolly from Inverness and Martin Macguire from Glasgow. Second place was Tony McSorley from Glasgow. And the first place was Petay Franz from Perth. It’s great to see a guy who hasn’t skated here in five years come back and win it. Magical – on the 20th anniversary! He got married the day before, then came here and won the skate jam. It’s a pretty good weekend if I say so myself!
Things to look forward to for the next skate jam?
Hopefully, we just continue to grow. You can’t do it without the community to back it and the help from sponsors that donated money, products, and resources to run the event. It helps massively when it’s coming from a corporate pocket instead of your own.
Hopefully, we just expand. Every jam has a trophy now; I think we’re the first skate jam in Scotland to do that because of grateful donations from a local company, “No Comply Designs”, who create products out of old, used skateboards, sorta recycled.
Perth Skatepark would like to thank all the sponsors that helped make this year happen! Check them out below:
*All image credits go to Spicy Skateboarding; find them on Instagram here.*
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