Learn more about Closer Skateboarding, take a look at the last issue, find contact details for the magazine and more.
Closer is an independent magazine dedicated to skateboarding culture. Closer brings together the finest journalism and photography to deliver a premium approach to a contemporary skateboarding publication underscored by a reverence for skateboarding history.
The team behind Closer is a cross-generational cast combining today’s most prolific storytellers and those with decades of experience writing, shooting and working in skateboarding media.
The editorial team includes founder and director and Jaime Owens (TransWorld Skateboarding and Skateboarder Magazine, formerly), Eric Swisher (The Chrome Ball Incident) and Farran Golding (Quartersnacks, Skate Bylines) who are joined by art director, Keegan Callaghan (Transworld Skateboarding, formerly). Regular photographers include Matt Price (Kinser, Golden Hour), J. Grant Brittain, Mike Heikkila, Kyle Seidler, Ben Colen, Bryce Kanights and Anthony Acosta are regular contributors, and many more. (View the full masthead here.)
Closer is printed four times annually in Costa Mesa, USA. Subscribers receive their copies hot off the press and Closer in stocked in skate stores around the world alongside our web store.
Latest Issue: Closer Skateboarding Issue #15, Volume 4.3, Summer 2026
Closer Skateboarding Issue 15 is dedicated to the memory of Marc Johnson, featuring a double wrap front and back cover shot by Anthony Acosta and Ben Colen, respectively.
The issue features memorial articles to to Marc, columums by Natalie Porter, Michael Sieben, Andrew Murrell, and Clyde Singleton, an expansive feature on Slappy Trucks’ first tour with the likes of Leo Romero and Georgia Martin in tow, a Chris Athan’s feature interview focused on the intricacies of hill-bombing in San Francisco and special instalment of The Chrome Ball Incident as we navigate Alien Workshop’s Mind Field with acclaimed cinematographer Greg Hunt.
Please note: Closer #12 is now sold out on our web-store but is available at Closer stockists worldwide. Head here find your nearest stockist and support your local.
Favorites from the print edition of Closer
- ‘Have You Met Nelly Morville?’ — An Interview with Limosine’s Breakout Star
- Louie Lopez’s Days of Grace
- Ariana Spencer — One Rad Mom
- Topography: Wallrides with Silas Baxter-Neal
- The Long Play with Mason Silva: Early 2000s Skate Video Soundtracks
- A Static Retrospective with Josh Stewart: Part I: Starting Light — the Original Static Trilogy• Part II: Closing Doors — Static IV and V • Part III: End of the Line — Josh Stewart on Static VI
- Jason Adams: Fifty Years to Life and Clear Eyed Sobriety
Contact and Communications for Closer Skateboarding
Email: jaime@closerskate.com
Instagram: @closerskateboarding
YouTube: @CloserSkateboarding
Mailing: Closer Skateboarding LLC, 905 Calle Negocio #74261, San Clemente, CA, 92673
An introduction from Jaime Owens, founder and director
Originally published in Closer Skateboarding Issue #1, 2022
Jaime Owens by Mike Heikkila for Slam City Skates | Text originally published in Closer Skateboarding #1, Summer 2022.
A lifetime dedicated to a useless wooden toy has led to this moment in my life. What you hold in your hands is a physical and tangible part of my entire being: my love for skateboarding. One of the best things about it is that it’s part of you as well. You wouldn’t be reading this if it weren’t. Our shared fascination with this toy and the culture that surrounds it means so much and has brought indescribable joy to us over the years. In a world that has an abundance of serious problems that demand our attention, it’s nice to know that we’ve found something, or some way, to escape it. Skateboarding is that escape, but it goes much deeper than that. It’s a way of life and it’s a way of looking at the world differently. Through the years, we’ve seen our heroes come and go while some have maintained, however the core of skateboarding has always stayed the same: the thrill of the ride. That’s what I want to capture with this magazine and with this brand in general—the eternal stoke of riding a skateboard which keeps us young, and the culture that it birthed, which has given it meaning to us beyond a passing fad.
I want to give a little background on who I am and why this magazine matters to me. I wrote about this in the first issue of TransWorld I worked on, but I think it’s good to revisit for context. I grew up in Florence, South Carolina, and started skating around 1984-85. It changed my life, like it did for so many of us here now. I was hooked and never looked back. I always identified so much with the outcast, weirdo, misfits, freaks-and-geeks vibe that skateboarding offered. It was the subculture to the mainstream, and I loved that. I loved feeling like we knew something cool that the masses didn’t know. Along with punk rock, skateboarding shaped my worldview and how I saw everything around me.
As years went by and I saw friends I grew up skating with giving up and moving on to other things, I couldn’t stop. It never crossed my mind. I knew this was the coolest thing in the world to be doing. I always knew I was never going to be a sponsored skater, but I knew that I wanted to maybe, just maybe, try to move to California one day and get into the industry. Whatever the hell that meant. But it was just one of those far-fetched dreams you have growing up in a small town, where you feel like you’re a million miles away from anything cool.
As I continued skating into my early 20s and graduated from college with no clear direction in life, I started to catch some very warranted grief from my dad. He probably thought I was the biggest slacker ever. He had just paid for four years of college, and every time he asked I could never give him a concrete answer on what I was going to do with the Art degree he’d just financed. I mean, by the age of 21, my dad was a Vietnam War Silver Star recipient for gallantry in battle. He was a man’s man. I, on the other hand, was a 24-year-old man-child who, even after graduating from college, was still working in a record store, singing in a hardcore band and skating in all my free time. I waved off his concerns with: “I’ll figure it out, Dad. Just give me time.”
Time was something he didn’t have.
My dad was diagnosed with an aggressive lung cancer soon after I graduated college. I dropped everything and went to live with him while he fought what we all knew to be an unwinnable battle. During one of those days when we were just hanging out and ignoring the obvious, I showed him a recent video part that I’d filmed. He was blown away by how much I’d improved since those early years of skating under his small carport for hours on end. I never heard him talk so proudly of my skateboarding before; I soaked up every word. He asked why I didn’t do something with that for a career. I told him I wasn’t good enough to be sponsored, but would love to move to California and get into the skate industry. He then said, plain and simple, “What’s holding you back? Go out there and do it!” I replied, “Because I’m scared!” His next response eventually changed my life forever: “Well, how will you ever know if you don’t try?”
A short time later, my dad passed away. After a few months of trying to process what had just happened, I made the decision to go for it. I grabbed my friend Matt Bradley and we hit the road in October 1999. With only my skateboard, a few changes of clothes, and some of my favorite punk records, we left all of our friends and family behind, with only one contact for an old friend from elementary school who lived in LA and wasn’t even a skater. We just drove west into the unknown.
Somehow, things worked out in California. I was able to miraculously sustain a 20-year career of making skateboard magazines at Skateboarder and TransWorld. Holy shit—that still blows my mind to this day. The whole time, I always thought that I didn’t belong here. I felt that I wasn’t supposed to really be in this position. It was like someone left the back door open to a cool party and I somehow snuck in uninvited and was waiting for someone to kick me out. That always played in the back of my mind, all the way to the end of my time at TransWorld in 2021.
Apparently, self-doubt is part of my makeup. But after a good year of being jobless and taking time to reflect on my life, I said, “Fuck that! I belong. I belong because I’m a skateboarder, and nobody owns this shit. I can love it just as much as the next skater. And I’m in a unique position to continue to contribute to the culture and work with as many folks who feel the same way as I do to try to make some skateboard magic.” And that’s what I intend to do.
That spark that ignited in me almost four decades ago still burns as bright as ever, if not brighter. Always and forever.
I’m so honored to have you all along for the journey. This is our journey. And it’s only the beginning.
[Sorry for those f-bombs, Mom. Thank you for buying me my first skateboard and always believing in me.]
— Jaime Owens, Closer Skateboarding Issue #1 (Spring 2022)
Press for Closer Skateboarding
The Mechanics of Skateboarding Magazine Covers • Quartersnacks (2026)
Photographer Matt Price is no stranger to his work making it to the cover of Closer. In this Quartersnacks article about the making’s of skate magazine covers, Price shares the story behind his Closer covers and experience shooting for the magazine.
“I reached out to Jaime Owens, and I was like, ‘Cover?’ That’s what’s nice about having a relationship with an editor. I’d never have the confidence to do that fifteen years ago.” — Matt Price
Evan Wasser by Matt Price for Closer #10 | Available here
Louie Lopez by Matt Price for Closer #3 | Available here
‘Skateboarding Stories of the Year’ • Simple Magic
Closer is proud to publish the work of some of skateboarding’s finest writers. Over the past few years, our articles have regularly featured in Simple Magic‘s annual round of up the best skate editorial that’s out there.
‘Austyn Gillette: The Chrome Ball Interview’ by Eric Swisher for Closer #9 (2025)
Find the Chrome Ball interview with Austyn Gillette in Closer #10, available here.
‘The Chrome Ball Team Manager Roundtable‘ by Eric Swisher for Closer #9 (2024)
Find the story featuring with Tum Yeto’s Mike Sinclair, Habitat’s Brennan Conroy and Crailtap’s Sam Smyth in Closer #9, available here.
‘Static VI: End of the Line with Josh Stewart’ by Andrew Murrell for Closer #6 (2023)
Read our story Static VI here and find full Static series retrospective with Josh Stewart in Closer #6, available here.
‘Character Witness: Kevin “Spanky” Long by Farran Golding for Closer #2 (2022)
Find our cover story on Spanky in Issue 2, available on our web-store.
‘Starting a Skateboarding Magazine and Other Radical Acts of Love’ • Quartersnacks (2023)
As one of skateboarding’s new creative publications, Closer and editor-in-chief Jaime Owens features in this article what goes into getting a magazine going in today’s media landscape.
From the shops
“[An] undiluted vision of how skateboarding should be presented. It’s a publication we’re proud to have on the shelves.
— Slam City Skates (London, UK)
“The best parts of all magazines from all eras of skateboarding.”
— The Palomino Club (London, UK)
Learn more about Closer with editor-in-chief Jaime Owens at Slam City Skates, Beyond Boards Podcast, Kinda Bummed, and on The Nine Club.
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