
Vintage Ski World Sharing the joyful history of skiing with the entire world.
Vintage Ski World owner Richard Allen began collecting skis and other gear in the late 1980's, including a pair of handmade Norwegian wooden skis that his grandfather used in the early 1900's. If that sounds like a long time ago, consider the fact that skiing may be as much as 7,000 years old, dating back to some skis that have been found in Scandinavia.
Richard Allen's passion for skiing is homegrown - he and his five brothers and sisters came to Aspen for the first time in 1959. In one black-and-white portrait, his family stands at the top of Aspen Mountain, clad in hand-knit ski sweaters and wool pants by White Stag, a popular brand at the time. Allen's father had ski-bummed in Aspen in the 1930's, when a boat tow hauled skiers up the mountain.
"All of us still ski, as do all of the grand-kids," he said. Allen moved to Aspen in the mid-'70's from Lake Minnetonka, Minn. He started Alpine Cleaning and eventually pursued his collecting hobby to its fullest, filling four storage spaces in Carbondale with memorabilia.
"In 1989 I found a sporting goods store in Portland, Oregon, with a basement full of new-old stock from the 1940's through '60's," he said. "It was all the skis, boots and poles that had never been sold."
Allen's collection continued to grow while he started a poster business and his first Internet store in 2002. For a couple of summers he sold his skiing posters and prints at the Aspen Saturday Market, and turned a van into a moving vintage skiing collection, which he still uses to host vintage ski-themed parties all over the West.
Mission Statement
Vintage Ski World, LLC preserves the history of skiing, by finding classic images and vintage ski equipment that brings skiing memories of the past to life and continues to promote the joy and passion of skiing. Vintage Ski World is the largest seller, in the world, of authentic vintage ski equipment and snow-sports artifacts.
We pursue our mission in a variety of ways:
|