Below Zero

Below zero in Copenhagen. A chilly wind from Norway making it colder. This is how you dress for it in Copenhagen.


Style Over Speed is the Cycle Chic motto. With the right photographer, style looks like it blends with speed. And somehow works. One hand firmly clasping his bespoke jacket closed against the Nordic wind.

And here's a lovely lyric:
I've got a bike.
You can ride it if you like.
It's got a basket, a bell that rings,
and things to make it look good.
I'd give it to you if I could, but I borrowed it.

You're the kind of girl that fits in with my world.
I'll give you anything, everything, if you want things.
Pink Floyd - 'Bike' - From 'The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn (1967)' album.

Frozen Sunlight Moments

A blindingly sunny day. Crisp and clear with a temperature reluctant to rise above freezing. Copenhageners pedalled ecstatically through it. Bundled up in scarves and hats and gloves. Above, you can either yawn or scratch. To each her own.

Or you can merely ride past and become an integral set piece in the production design of the urban theatre.

You can also challenge the chill by rising out of the saddle and making a break for the green light before it changes.

Funny how Lars was on Queen Louise's Bridge as well. We missed each other by an hour or so. We really should coordinate these things better and incorporate a cup of coffee. :-)

Copencouple + Sun

Riding arm in arm is an age old discipline for bicyclists in love. Perhaps because of the intoxicating cocktail of frost and sunlight we had today, we here see it in the superior hand-in-pocket variety.
NOTE: If you want to try it out for yourself, make sure that the two handlebars operates at different heights :-)

Copencouple

A stylish couple ride around the bicycle roundabout on the last day of yule/new years holidays.

Cycle Chic Shanghai Ride with Elyse Sewell

A little video by a model named Elyse Sewell shot while riding around Shanghai. Cool street shots of the Chinese megacity. Music by Manu Chao.


Me in China back in 1990. I bought a cheap and cheerful Chinese bike and rode around. I couldn't be bothered to take it on the train so I sold it and bought a new one at the next stop. Back in 1990 the bicycle was still king in China. The car began to appear in great numbers in the mid-1990's and cycling declined sharply. Fortunately, Chinese cities were quick off the mark and are now trying to implement bicycle-friendly infrastructure in order to curb pollution and obesity.

Bicycle Artistry

Another brilliant artistic rendering of one of my photos from the firm and talented hand of Texan artist Janet Karam.


The original photo that inspired the painting.

Copenhagen Aerodynamics

A little known Copenhagen cycling trick: combining a dapper flat cap [called a sixpence in Danish]and blue balloons will increase your aerodynamics on the bike lanes.

This and That Cycle Chic

A hardy Dutchman tackling the light snow and doing so in style. The photo is from David Hembrow's blog A View From the Cycle Path about a cycling life in Assens, Holland. As a fourth-generation basketmaker he produces splendid bicycle baskets, too.


This famous bicycle advert by French artist and printer G. Massias was produced for Gladiator Bicycles in 1895, when the bicycle craze was peaking. There was a wealth of adverts featuring women and bicycles, a testament to the bicycle's liberating qualities in society. Only four original poster exist today.

The poster and name is now used by - ironically - an American winemaker "Cycles Gladiator Wines" out of California. Thanks to Jan for the link.


Now I'm not a girl and I don't have a pony fetish but this combi-bicycle from Pony Pals, at the very least, is stylish and kiddie chic. Any bicycle that is far-removed from the sweaty sports fetish is a good bicycle. While it may look to some like a kitsch Made in China plaything it's interesting - and strange - that the saddle is designed by master saddle maker Paul Selvey. Not only that, the pony's head is created by Lado Goudjabidze, who also created a bust of Gandhi for the UN Headquarters and JFK at the Kennedy Center.

There are no prices on the website and I don't dare ask.

Urban Camouflage

If you were an anthropologist visiting Earth from another planet, you might be puzzled by these stripes. A mark of the tribe? Camouflage?
Of course WE know that it is just another winter night street corner in Copenhagen.

Winter Wear

Classic winter cycling wear on the bike lane.
Toasty warm hat and scarf, jacket and boots. And flowers on the bike basket, of course.

New Year's Day 2009

This illustration, 'The Spirit of the Wheel', was one of the many images celebrating the bicycle's liberating quality. It featured on the cover of the New York magazine 'Truth' back on 22 August 1896.

The Bicycle as Truth. The two-wheeled wonder liberated the working classes and it certainly liberated women around the turn of the last century. Will it liberate us from car-centric societies?

What truths apply here on the first day of 2009?

- The bicycle is the most efficient machine ever invented.
- Riding a bicycle does not require any form of equipment - apart from a bicycle.
- It is shockingly easy to look frightfully chic on a bicycle.
- Riding a bicycle in high heels and/or a skirt is quite simple [women have been doing it for more than a century, for heaven's sake].
- Anyone who actually knows what their bicycle weighs should be treated with suspicion.
- Anyone who claims that urban cycling requires lycra or any 'cycling gear' probably enjoys cycling, but one should take their advice with a grain of salt,
- Coaster brakes are chic, normal and better than those finger-squeezy gadgets.
- If you had all the bicycles on the planet lined up in front of you, you wouldn't be able to see a racing bike or a mountain bike to save your life. They would drown in the mass of normal bicycles like the ones you see on this blog.
- Cycle Chic will continue growing throughout 2009. Taking back the bicycle culture for regular people on regular bikes all over the world.