“Old Europe,” someone once said. Old? Indeed, when comparing what happened at the first European Handmade Bicycle Expo, which convened in the German city of Schwäbish Gmünd this May, with the slightly older NAHBS, one might use this same, simple adjective, even though that speaker’s context differed.
- Words & Photos by Bruce Carnevale -
Yes, European framebuilders are somehow “old,” meaning traditional, less playful, even, when viewed from NAHBS’s perspective, “conservative,” risk-adverse, ... some of the epithets that could also describe other aspects of European life. Take cuisine, for example, the American west coast is experimenting in ways some Europeans would only shake their head at. Thrashing tradition or inventing? An old dialect, an old pair that bore fruit in comparing framebuilder’s art.
Not that the EHBE was dull. While Americans have been honing their craft, albeit with a particularly nutty flavor (Vanilla’s single speed townie with an ISP was beautiful, and I want one, but practical?), their craft of what handbuilt can mean makes some Europeans look rather conservative. The huge conglomerate “Europe” may have, without knowing it, rested on its laurels too long. Perhaps, however, the American flavor is just tasteless to them. What one saw at EHBE was, often, solidity and continuity.
Pegoretti's barbed wire themes were exemplary of the finish detail across the floor.
To be fair, though, this was the first EHBE, and one who has exhibited at both, American expatriate Darren Crisp, compared it to the first NAHBS, finding the EHBE “a much more effective event.” If anything seemed strange, it was the lack of some builders and the inclusion of many others. Why were Litespeed, Merlin, Seven, IF at EHBE?
The “European” in the title was meant, says organizer Indra Sarkar, to refer to the location of the expo, not that of the builders. And while some of the more interesting manufacturers were not present – “the German carbon scene wasn’t interested” said Sarkar – like German Spin, EHBE presented a few, real European highlights. Still I missed French carbon manufacturer Cyfac as well as the classical and classy steelbuilder Marschall from Germany. What follows are a few highlights and, I think, somewhat unknown to an English-speaking audience. Yes, Lightweight was there, but you know enough about them!
Nordischer Rahmenbau – literally “Northern Frame Construction” – is a one-man company from Northern Germany. Engineer Oliver Grest only makes two to three frames a year, but he makes EVERYTHING, including the tubes, using carbon rovings and a computer-controlled system, pressed-in bearings, etc. Road frames generally weighs under 900 grams. Mostly, however, he binds stems to bars à la Ruegamer in the States or builds seatpost/seat combinations. Unfortunately, Grest came to the fair on day two; I was there on day one.
An Italian framebuilder has also appeared at NAHBS (who also see geography loosely, naming only the event location), Tiziano Zullo impressed by his stress on tradition as well as finish. If there was an award for best finished frames proudly displaying a traditional pedigree, Zullo could have won it.
Zullo once sponsored the Dutch squad, TVM, in the LeMond era and now, in the steel-is-real crowd makes a few frames, well in the lower 100’s annually, for the discerning few. He does carbon, but steel is his real love. When I asked him what’s the new thing, he said “at the moment there are no new materials and personally I think that we will work for all with steel.” Tradition, solidity, continuity!
Pegoretti was a natural for this fair and displayed several bikes with a barbed wire motif, perhaps portraying the framebuilder’s “frame” of mind regarding his fight against cancer.
Beautiful frames. Ditto for DeRosa, who came with a vintage time-trial Merckx from 1975. Most likely used, I was told, in the Tour that year.
Another steel-is-real man was Ulrich Vogel from Germany. His frames attempted, like others, to meld old and new, and his homage on early 80’s bike art, a racing bike complete with a NOS Mavic gruppo only belied its heritage on account of a one-piece stem-handlebar construction with a Vogel logo.
His street bike, replete with Japanese bike parts, including a Nitto moustache bar, was an eye-catcher. Perhaps, UrGerman, Ulrich’s details were only seen upon closer inspection – check out this seatstay construction with logo.
If there wasn’t much handcraft innovation, or better, handcraft obsession, at EHBE, there was attitude and the love of bikes as a basic means of transportation: the Berlin-based “Daily Bread” (name as motto) displayed their one-frame only concept with various components. Others came and displayed bikes that were far from beautiful (thinking Vanilla again) but in the form-follows-function crowd – intensely practical.
But ‘tude was best represented by Fixie-Inc., a German company run by a German and a German-Turk. While they do not count as “framebuilders” per se, as their steel only frames are not made in house, their passion for everything bicycle was infectious.
Start a conversation with them and you’ll get an earful of bike enthusiasm. Their ideal and ideas more than made up for lacking home-field advantage: polo bikes, belt-driven bikes (perhaps THE trend at EHBE) or the rust bucket, a frame they left outside for days, weeks, then preserved as “Art.”
Similarly, though having their frames made in China, the Spanish Amaro brought titanium road bikes with mountain bike wheels, more ‘tude. Unusual for EHBE.
Titanium had many proponents at EHBE: Amaro, the Americans, the British Enigma, and the Italians: DeRosa, Nevi, Passioni and expat Darren Crisp, who lives in Tuscany. The later was the one who brought all the themes together, old, new, basic and innovative, even the beauty of things unseen.
No newcomer to fairs, Darren won best titanium bike at the first NAHBS a good five years ago. His work was not limited to racing bikes, as many others were, and belied craftsmanship, clarity and no BS.
Crisp showed belt-driven city bikes – where you could not see how he got the belt in the frame, no S&S couplers like everyone else used – mountain bikes using the Cannondale lefty fork and a road bike he made for the Italian vanqueur of Flanders from ’49 to ’51 – Fiorenzo Magni (who also won the Giro in ’49 and ’51 and almost won the Tour in ‘50) – with a trick front derailleur. Crisp began laboring as an architecture designer and his love for the minimal details shows in his work.
According to Sarkar, nearly 90% of the exhibitors are returning next year. So if NABHS’s development is any indication of things to come, EHBE should be even more interesting next year. Perhaps enough to bring new Europe, too?
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