Da NAHBS Pt. 3

So much to see. We saw a lot of generators with wires going internally into the racks they were mounted on, we saw lots of Enve forks, and Iris bottle cages, extended seatmasts were everywhere, and carbon Gates drives, too. And we saw many more CX bikes than we expected to see.

Here are some more things that really caught our eye:

 Cykelmaguren Copenhagen makes city bikes, hubs and wood grips, but "brake levers" which are
beads strung across two metal clamps was what first captured my attention.

This Kirk Lee frame was done for a client who wanted an Atlas theme (He was a fan of
"Atlas Shrugged" I think). At first I thought the graphics were digitized, but everything was
handpainted. The headtube image glows and the supporting light rays and stripes
looked great.

While he's no Atlas, Don Walker (NAHBS founder)
has no problem owning this headtube.

NAHBS sophmore Demon Frameworks won an award for this incredible road frame.
Blurry pic doesn't do it justice.

Custom dropout on the Demon.

This frame set from English is missing half its fork and half its stays. The designer
says it rides just like any other bike despite missing some tubes.
He had to do some engineering to get the hubs to work for this unique design.

This Ira Ryan utility bike was amazing for more than one just its design.
If you look closely the bike and the 2-wheel trailer was equipped with
at least three Chris King headsets(see below) and three Chris King hubs. Whoa!

More NAHBS: Independent Fabrications' Caffeine Racer Mixte

Independent Fabrications showed off a spectacular mixte at the North American Handbuilt Bike Show. It was built for company owner Gary Smith's wife Toni. Inspired by the cafe racer movement in motorbikes, this Barracuda Purple and black checkerboard beauty features an 8 speed internal hub, Phil-centric BB, a carbon and aluminum disk brake fork, Paul racer brakes in the rear, a dynamo powered headlight, and of course, a custom painted stainless steel coffee tumbler. Last but not least they put on a set of our chrome-plated Condorina "cafe racer" bars. (Photos by John Prolly and IF Blog)

We have to agree that speccing our Condorina Bar was a smart move.

Custom IF mug

Soma's Oxford handlebar featured on NAHBS Best Lugged Frame!!

picture c/o the NAHBS website

My boss Jim and Bradley of American Cyclery went on a little trip to the NAHBS this weekend (lucky bastards). They came back with a tales of revelry, in awe of all the great work they saw. Most exciting was the amount of Soma products they spotted!!(pics to come..promise!)

This gorgeous bike built by Bilenky Cycle Works won Best Lugged Frame. Here's the skinny:

"Brett and Shelly Horton commissioned Bilenky Cycle Works to build this “constructeur” (most pieces are handmade or hand finished) city bicycle." This bike pays homage to Art Deco movement everywhere from the script on the downtube to the lugs.

Most importantly take a close look at the cockpit...check out the mirror polished SOMA OXFORD HANDLEBARS on it!! They looks very classy with the modified Cardiff Julian grips. We at Soma are honored to be part of such a beautiful build.

We're working on a more extensive post about the show, no worries. We were pretty stoked about this though, so we wanted to get it out asap!! Stay tuned...