As the founder of Telluride-based Wagner Custom Skis, Pete Wagner is always on the hunt for good wood. So when, in May 2024, an executive told him Aspen Skiing Company was sitting on a pile of spruce, Wagner didn’t hesitate: “I’ll take it.”

Aspen Mountain began glading trails on a 153-acre expansion in summer 2022. The terrain, which opened in December 2023 and is known as Hero’s, is a smorgasbord of steep drops, tight trees, and moguls. Using spruce harvested from Hero’s, Wagner produced 30 pairs of skis in various sizes, each of them all-mountain rippers. Made with a metal and aspen core and a varnished spruce topsheet emblazoned with aspen leaves, they’re designed to be light but strong. “We built them so that they can perform in bumps and steeps and anything in between,” Wagner says. Currently, his initial run of Hero’s skis can be demoed from the resort-owned Aspen Collection stores in Aspen and Snowmass ($199 per day) and were recently made available for purchase.

But Wagner, who started his company in 2006, still has enough wood remaining to make 50 more pairs of bespoke skis. “Based on a skier’s ability, height, weight, and several other factors, we can build a ski with the perfect stiffness, camber, rocker, tail shape, sidecut, width, and length,” Wagner says. “We have about 2,500 different material combinations to choose from.” That kind of customization comes with a hefty price tag. A pair of custom Hero’s skis, mounted with a binding, costs $3,500.

The payoff lies in more than just performance: Each set comes with a heck of a story for the chairlift.

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