Rip Curl

For many surfers, yes — wetsuits are where Rip Curl has spent the most of itself. The brand began making wetsuits back in 1970, adapting diving technology into something built for surfing, and that long obsession shows in models like the FlashBomb, which won the SIMA Wetsuit of the Year award three years running in 2011, 2012 and 2013. If you surf cold water often, the premium tends to pay off in warmth and quick-drying comfort.

Rip Curl has built a reputation on technical products and innovation in the surf industry, and the trophy cabinet backs it up — its FlashBomb wetsuit took Wetsuit of the Year three consecutive times, and the brand has racked up wins across the SIMA and SBIA awards for everything from boardshorts to swimwear. It is widely regarded as one of the strongest names in surf hardwear.

The three are often called the Big Three of surfing, and they share more than rivalry — Alan Green, a co-founder of Quiksilver, was actually a Rip Curl employee in 1969 and developed the first Quiksilver boardshorts at the Rip Curl factory in April 1970. Rip Curl is the oldest of the trio, founded in 1969, and is especially known for its wetsuit technology and surf heritage.

It came off a surfboard. Co-founder Doug Warbrick bought a vee-bottom board in 1968 with "Rip Curl Hot Dog" written on it. He later admitted the words didn't really mean anything — "ripping was groovy; surfing the curl was groovy; we wanted to be groovy," as he put it — and the name stuck.

Rip Curl was founded in 1969 by Doug Warbrick and Brian Singer in Torquay, on the coast of Victoria, Australia. It started out making surfboards before turning to wetsuits the following year. Torquay remains the spiritual home of the brand and a touchstone of Australian surf culture.

The Search is Rip Curl's long-running campaign built around the idea of chasing waves to far-flung, undiscovered places. It produced a series of celebrated surf films by filmmaker Sonny Miller, beginning with The Search in 1992; one of them, Searching for Tom Curren, was named Video of the Year by Surfer magazine in 1997. Rip Curl relaunched The Search in 2015.

Surfwear and, above all, wetsuits. Rip Curl is an Australian designer, manufacturer and retailer of surfing sportswear and a major athletic sponsor, and it has grown into one of the largest surf companies across Australia, Europe, the Americas and South Africa. Its wetsuit innovation — the award-winning FlashBomb chief among it — is the cornerstone of its identity.

Yes. While surfing is the heart of the brand, Rip Curl is now present across several board sports including skateboarding and surfskating, freestyle skiing, snowboarding and wakeboarding. It runs events spanning these disciplines, from the Rip Curl SurfSkate Festival to the Rip Curl World Heli Challenge for freestyle skiing and snowboarding.

Rip Curl was sold in October 2019 to the outdoor specialist company Kathmandu. For its first fifty years it had been guided by its co-founders, Doug Warbrick and Brian Singer; in August 2021, Brooke Farris was appointed chief executive officer.

Start with your water temperature and how often you surf, then match the thickness and warmth to that. Rip Curl's range runs from accessible all-rounders up to flagship technical suits like the award-winning FlashBomb line, so a once-a-summer surfer and a cold-water regular will want very different suits. Fit matters as much as thickness — a suit that's too loose flushes cold water and undoes the warmth you paid for.