Every few months somebody declares that skateboarding has changed. Usually it's an older skater complaining about social media, contests, the Olympics or some new trend they don't understand. The argument is normally the same. Skateboarding has become too polished. Too commercial. Too serious. Too focused on numbers, followers and algorithms. According to some corners of the internet, the rebellious, creative spirit that made skateboarding special disappeared years ago.
The funny thing is that if you actually go skateboarding, none of that feels remotely true.
Spend an afternoon at a local skatepark, a DIY spot or a city centre session and you'll quickly realise that skateboarding still feels exactly like skateboarding. The tricks might be bigger. The filming might be better. The boards might be lighter. But the thing that matters most hasn't changed at all. It's still a bunch of people finding interesting ways to interact with the world around them. It's still creativity. It's still self-expression. It's still a culture built around doing things your own way.
You just have to know where to look.
That's why brands like DGK, WKND and Toy Machine continue to matter. Not because they're chasing every trend or trying to dominate every corner of the industry, but because they represent something that has always sat at the heart of skateboarding. Personality.
For all the talk about progression, skateboarding has never really been about who can do the hardest trick. If it was, we'd all skate exactly the same way. We'd ride the same setups, wear the same clothes and film the same clips. The reality is completely different. Ask ten skaters who their favourite rider is and you'll probably get ten different answers. That's because style, creativity and individuality have always mattered just as much as technical ability. The best skateboarders aren't necessarily the most consistent athletes. They're the people who make you want to go skating.
That's where these brands thrive.
Take DGK. From the beginning, DGK represented a side of skateboarding that many brands either ignored or didn't understand. The brand wasn't built around perfect skate plazas or glossy California imagery. It was built around raw street skating. Around the idea that skateboarding belonged to everybody, regardless of where they came from or what their background looked like. There was always an energy to DGK videos that felt authentic. Fast, rough, chaotic and unapologetically street. Even now, decades later, that attitude remains baked into everything the company does. When you see a DGK graphic or watch a DGK rider, you instantly know what you're looking at. It feels genuine because it comes from a genuine place.
WKND sits at almost the opposite end of the spectrum, but somehow arrives at the same destination. If DGK represents raw energy, WKND represents skateboarding's sense of humour. In an era where every brand seems desperate to look important, WKND reminds everyone that skateboarding is supposed to be fun. Their graphics are strange. Their videos are often ridiculous. Their social media has never taken itself too seriously. Yet underneath the jokes is some of the most creative skateboarding you'll find anywhere. WKND understands something a lot of people forget. The reason most of us started skating wasn't because we wanted to become professional athletes. It was because skateboarding looked fun.
Then there's Toy Machine, arguably one of the greatest examples of a brand maintaining its identity across multiple generations. While countless companies have reinvented themselves to chase changing trends, Toy Machine has remained unmistakably Toy Machine. Ed Templeton's artwork, the iconic Monster graphics, the weird sense of humour and the slightly twisted view of the world have remained consistent for decades. Somehow the brand still appeals to skaters discovering it for the first time while simultaneously connecting with people who grew up watching Toy Machine videos twenty years ago. That's incredibly difficult to achieve in any industry, never mind one that moves as quickly as skateboarding.
What's interesting is that all three brands succeed for completely different reasons. Their graphics look different. Their teams skate differently. Their videos feel different. Yet they all share one important characteristic. None of them feel manufactured.
That's becoming increasingly valuable.
Modern skateboarding exists in a strange place. The level of skating has never been higher. You can open your phone and watch tricks that would have won competitions twenty years ago being landed by teenagers before breakfast. The access to information, tutorials, videos and inspiration is incredible. At the same time, it's become easier than ever for everything to start feeling the same. Algorithms reward familiarity. Trends spread instantly. Certain spots get skated to death. Certain tricks become fashionable. The risk is that skateboarding slowly loses some of the weirdness that made it special in the first place.
Thankfully, brands like DGK, WKND and Toy Machine continue pushing in the opposite direction.
They remind people that skateboarding doesn't need to fit neatly into a box. It doesn't need to be optimised. It doesn't need to appeal to everybody. Some of the best things in skateboarding have always come from people doing something slightly different. A strange graphic. An unusual video edit. A trick choice that makes absolutely no sense until you see it landed. That's where skateboarding's personality comes from.
It's also why these brands resonate so strongly in places like Nottingham.
Skateboarding here has never been about chasing perfection. We don't have endless sunshine or world-famous plazas. We have rough spots, hidden gems, awkward architecture and generations of skaters figuring things out as they go. The local scene has always rewarded creativity over conformity. If you can make something interesting happen on a rough Nottingham spot, you'll probably be able to skate anywhere.
That's why brands with strong identities feel at home here. They reflect the same mindset. The idea that skateboarding should be personal. That your setup says something about who you are. That your favourite video part probably reveals more about your personality than your Spotify playlist.
And maybe that's the real answer to the question people keep asking.
Has skateboarding changed?
Of course it has.
Everything changes.
But the soul of skateboarding was never tied to a specific era, a specific trick or a specific generation. It lives in the people who continue doing things their own way. The skaters choosing creativity over conformity. The brands refusing to become generic. The local scenes keeping things interesting. The weird graphics, the strange ideas, the rough spots and the sessions that end with everyone laughing more than they land.
That's still skateboarding.
It always has been.
And if you look around carefully, you'll realise it's alive and well.
