“What has ‘Vintage Bike Restorations’ got to do with design146?” you ask. During the ‘Lock-down’ things have been much less busy than usual, so I decided to find myself something a bit different to do to keep myself busy.
I’m a keen cyclist, so one day I decided to buy a few vintage bikes, strip them down, and return them to their former glory. Hopefully in the process I could give the bikes a new lease of life, and give someone a shiny new toy to play with. On top of all that I could learn a few things about how bikes work.
In total I did 3; the first an Ammaco ‘Monte Carlo’, a replica of a bike ridden by the great Tony Doyle to win the World Championship in the 1980s. The second, by coincidence, was an earlier Tony Doyle replica, this time from Viscount in the early 1980s – this one had to be resprayed and my graphic design skills were useful for recreating the decals.
Finally, I found a bike designed specifically for a toy and bike shop in Bristol called Max Williams. This one is earlier, probably from the 1970s and was a beauty, even with ‘BRISTOL’ written on the frame – I sold the other 2, but this one I’m keeping for myself!