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The 2025 Made Bike Show in Portland, Oregon, drew crowds of people to admire Beautiful Bicycles from around the world. Paul Kalifatidi was in attendance with his pen and notepad ready, capturing some of the best overheard quotes from the showcase along with a fun gallery of people, places, and things from the weekend…
For the next installment of Radical Rigs, Paul Kalifatidi presents a portrait of frame builder Greg Heath (Donkelope Bikes) alongside his 2000 Toyota Tacoma SR5 and various purple bikes…
Paul Kalifatidi visits the design and fabrication studio of Loam Equipment, makers of custom technical accessories in beautiful Bellingham, Washington. Rachel Bjarnason and Alan Martinez craft one-of-a-kind frame bags that add character and function to bikes throughout the Pacific Northwest and beyond. But there’s much more to Loam than frame bags. Take a peek behind the scenes at Loam Equipment…
In a sunny studio overlooking the bustling streets of Seattle’s Pioneer Square, High Above consists of three craftsmen working to produce the highest quality riding bags on the market. Bathed in beautiful (and rare) late winter sunlight, Kyle, Spencer, and Eric plug away at various sewing machines. A 2D CNC machine hums in the back of the room, making patterns the human hand finds difficult. A blueprint of the Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk, inspiration for the pattern taking shape on the CNC table, hangs on the wall. This all sounds very serious, but please know that the industrial-looking CNC machine has googly eyes. This is High Above, and they produce nothing but quality.
High Above has been making Hip Packs and various bike accessories in Washington for more than a decade. Hip Packs are their tried and true, but their new product aims to fit the demands of riders who want a different way to carry more gear. Follow along with this two-article special as Paul Kalifatidi steals their new jetpack, er, Supernatural Vest Pack, gives it a proper shake-down, and takes the shredded remains back to their secret lab in Seattle. Spoiler alert, I was unable to damage anything besides my integumentary system. Now, I get to share my thoughts on what I believe is this segment-leading product. I managed to get out for a ride with High Above co-owner, Kyle Thackray, on the pack’s namesake trail.
For the next installment of the Radical Rigs series, Paul Kalifatidi presents a portrait of videographer, dirt-bike rescuer, and bike handler, Logan Patrick Nelson, alongside his 1999 Toyota RAV4 and Gary Fisher Aquila.
For the last few months, “Pink Pony Club” by Chappel Roan has been playing on repeat out of the small garage doors of Baphomet Bicycles. Behind the little blue Suzuki Jimny with safari windows, Dillen Maurer’s newest creation was taking shape. Bellingham-based Radavist contributor Paul Kalifatidi caught up with Dillen to check out his garage shop and see what he was cooking up for this year‘s Tour Divide. Let’s check it out…
People ride bikes for many reasons: their practicality, simplicity, exercise, and, hell, even for fun. Adding aftermarket details, tuning the bike to their preferences, and making aesthetic choices are all part of the joy of self-expression through these mechanical contraptions. Bikes can be a labor of love.
Many bike tinkerers possess an overlapping interest in vehicles. For many of us, cars, trucks, vans, and four-wheeled contraptions are just larger and more complicated sources of labor and recipients of love than our bikes. Few bike repairs involve laying on freezing concrete and sending a tight fist filled with a cold ratchet at Mach 3 into the bottom of a steering rack.
Most bikes can be repaired without an obscure connection to an overseas junkyard. For those of us who appreciate unreliability and tom-foolery, we present Radical Rigs, with support from 1Up USA. Like the bikes on The Radavist, these rigs might be perfect. They also might be so far from perfection that they go full circle and become better than perfect. They might be dented and dinged, they might be muddy and marred, but they’re all rad.
For this installment of this series, Paul Kalifatidi presents a portrait of free-rider, Blake Hansen, and her 80-series Land Cruiser and bar-spinning Specialized Status.
To folks with disabilities, an electric bike can be much more than a recreational device. Dillen Maurer, a familiar face to Radavist regulars, reviews the Salsa Confluence ($2,999), a gravel e-bike, from his unique perspective as an amputee. Paul Kalifatidi provides the images. Let’s dive in…
People ride bikes for many reasons: their practicality, their simplicity, exercise, self-expression, and hell, even for fun. Adding aftermarket details, tuning the bike to their preferences, and making aesthetic choices are all part of the fun. Working on bikes, building bikes, and riding bikes can be a labor of love.
Many bike tinkerers possess an overlapping interest in cars. For those people, we present Radical Rigs, with support from 1Up USA. Like the bikes on The Radavist, these rigs might be perfect. They also might be so far from perfection that they go full circle and become better than perfect. They might be dented and dinged, they might be muddy and marred, but they’re all rad.
For the next installment of this new series, Paul Kalifatidi presents a portrait of Bellingham trailbuilder Flynn alongside his 1997 Mitsubishi Delica and Raaw Jibb.
Many bike tinkerers often have an overlapping interest in cars. For those of you in this sliver of the Venn Diagram, Paul Kalifatidi presents the Radical Rigs series. Like the bikes you’ve seen on The Radavist, these cars might be perfect. They also might be so far from perfection that they go full circle and become that which they meant to eschew. They might be dented and dinged, they might be muddy and mad, they might even just be rad. In part one of Radical Rigs, Paul juxtaposes Dillen Maurer‘s Baphomet Bikes “Fall Risk” custom full suspension and his “Lil Jim” 1992 Suzuki…
