Expect to see something cool, different, functional and artsy coming to Mineola’s skate park soon.

Through a collaboration with UT Tyler sculpture, design and art professor Dewane Hughes, Flint and Steel is bringing a new piece of art to their home park. The sculpture is none other than a giant, 20-foot skateboard.

Not only will the new art instillation look awesome, but it functions with dual purpose: the sculpture will be “100% skate-able” and is also a bench to rest on. It is also being designed with photo ops in mind.

“Any progress on the park is exciting, but this specifically means a lot to us because it allows people to skate for longer now that they have a shaded area to rest and recover,” said Flint and Steel’s Nathan Witt.

According to Hughes, the sculpture will be “a giant bench that looks like half of a skateboard.” It is already under construction in his personal studio.

It will be made of stainless steel, mild steel and “maybe some powder-coated parts.” These materials will make the bench resistant to weather, damage from continual skating and becoming too hot during the Texas summers.

“The hope is that the stainless (steel) will make it so that, if it gets beat on or spray painted, that kind of stuff, that it will be very easy to deal with. And if it’s going to be something functional, where skaters are going to be whaling on it, the stainless will hopefully hold up,” said Hughes.

Hughes is also designing the sculpture to prohibit skating on top of the overhang, but to encourage it on the more accessible parts.

“In true ‘by skaters, for skaters’ fashion, we had (Hughes) talk with a few of our biggest skate community leaders to come up with the design,” said Witt. “It’s pretty cool looking.”

Witt notes that, despite the popularity of the park’s brand-new concrete elements, the sculpture will “ironically probably be one of the most used elements of the park.”

Hughes is doing the project for the cost of materials only.

“I’m happy to help out,” he said.

Hughes says that he’s hoping to complete construction on the bench by mid-March.