Pat Rawson

Pat Rawson is a legendary shaper based on the North Shore of Oahu.

He began shaping in his parents garage in Playa Del Rey in 1966 by peeling the glass off of old boards and reshaping them. Pat moved to the North Shore in 1974 to finish college and shape surfboards. In 1977 he founded Local Motion surfboards with Rob Burns.

Pat was working with Gordon Clark at Clark Foam from the beginning experimenting with foam densities, foils and rockers and Pat shaped many of the surfboard blanks that shapers make their boards out of today.

Living and shaping in Hawaii has given Pat the opportunity to build boards for the best surfers in the world for all types of surfing conditions from perfect Pipeline to small South Shore. In the 70’s “Buttons” Kaluhiokalani and Larry Bertlemann helped to make his small wave designs popular.

In the 80’s working with guys like Tom Carroll, Tom Curren, Michael and Derek Ho, Luke Egan, and Mark Richards highlighted his career and helped to make Rawson the most sought after gun shaper in the world. In the 90’s to the present, Rawson has been shaping boards for almost everyone in surfing’s lime light. Kalani Robb, Bruce Irons, and the Hobgoods have influenced his guns into the thinner foils, carvier rockers that are popular today. Currently Rawson is at the forefront of tow board design with the help of his son Ryan Rawson.

In 2002 Dan Boehne met with Rawson to work on gun design in Hawaii and in 2004 Rawson started making boards for Infinity. Pat Rawson flies to California one to two times per month to shape the inventory and custom boards personally. Unlike many other big name shapers, he finishes all of his boards himself, by hand. Our Infinity-Rawson models cover his entire surfboard line up with an emphasis on big wave and travel boards.

His retro 80’s boards and small wave boards are currently very popular in California and the East Coast. Come in to Infinity to see the new lineup of Infinity Surfboards shaped by Pat Rawson or have him shape you a board customized to your surfing needs based on his 38+ years of shaping experience.