Oh My Bloc 2023

I started climbing over 30 years ago in the forest of Fontainebleau and have been a weekend visitor ever since. I’ve seen the place change, but the attraction remains. The forest is a magic place that deserves protection.

Thanks to the boom in indoor bouldering, there are now over 2 million climbers in Central Europe. And just like I did 30 years ago, many of those find their way to the boulders of Fontainebleau.

That doesn’t necessarily need to be a bad thing. It’s hard not to become a bit of an environmentalist after visiting a magic place like Font. And our planet needs more people who care about the environment.

But there’s an undeniable direct impact of this increase in interest. The hyper-frequentation of these natural areas can lead to degradation of the environment: soil erosion, waste, noise and visual pollution, disturbance of the fauna, slow degradation (patina and breakage) of the boulders, etc …

That’s why we were more than happy to sponsor the “Sustainable Bouldering Festival” last year and why we are doing it again. Small name change: it’s called “Oh My Bloc” now but the core remains the same: encouraging a sustainable use of the forest and raising awareness about climbing ethics.

With the increased amount of visitors the last part is more important than ever. You can read the full “Font Ethics” guidelines here but I’d like to quickly highlight number 8 on the list: “Don’t overuse chalk”.

Chalk use has become an integral part of climbing culture and we’re not going to change that ingrained habit immediately. Even though we’re a company selling climbing chalk, we strongly encourage a responsible use of it, especially in nature.

We took great care in all steps of our production process to give you the cleanest (seawater-based) and most performant chalk (with Upsalite) and encourage you to use as little as possible of it on the beautiful boulders of Fontainebleau.

How? It all starts by knowing your skin. Once you know your skin type (Sweaty? Oily?), you can choose the right strategy for optimal grip while minimizing the amount of chalk residue you leave on the rock.

Visit our stand at the Festival to discover your skin type and the optimal routine to use less chalk, get more grip and make your skin last longer. We will demo and sell all of our products. See you there!