‘La Chapelle - ZONE 13’ came together from the cooperation of Niels Schack and the resort Avoriaz in France. The idea was to make a concept park using recycled materials and work with sculptures to create features that were unique.

Niels explains how it all went down...

I contacted two sculptors, Vicente Lesser from Geneva and Gareth Andrews from London, who also happens to be a snowboarder, to see if they were interested in the concept. After getting the green lights from their part we got to spend a week in Avoriaz in November with the snow park team.

The first day was just taking things out of huge recycle containers and making an inventory of all the things we had. From then on we started drawing up plans for the features and the rest of the week was welding, cleaning, cutting and assembling all these different parts.

“We've done more than we thought we could have done! It was really fun to have all the tools and materials to be able to create whatever we wanted” - Gareth Andrews. I proposed to Vicente that we should make gates, to create a direction and a way through the park. He then followed his own creativity to make them come to life.

“The architecture of Avoriaz is really one of a kind and so I used that for inspiration for the sculptors” - Vicente Lesser. The idea was not to make a street park, but rather create a park that resembles when you ride in the city. When you have a street spot there is always a lamppost, a wall or other things that are ‘in the way’ but that’s what makes it magical: to use the architecture in a way that’s influences your riding and play with that concept. That was the idea behind the park and it was a truly a pleasure to put them together and have the freedom to make it happen.

The sculptures will be displayed in the Avoriaz Tourist Office from March. Once park features, to ornaments.

Enjoy the video below taking you from the creation to riding: