As a preface to John’s coverage of the Bespoked X Brother Apocalypse Build Off at Bespoked UK, we have Petor’s impetus for the event. With shop visits to Bikefix, Seabass Cycles, and Stayer Cycles, Petor sets the stage for the Apocalypse Build Off…
Who would you want in your bunker? Why are you in a bunker? If you have a bunker, you’re fruity enough to have heaps of supplies – so it’s a question of how long you think you’ll need to be in the bunker versus how overstocked on supplies you are. Will you make it that long with an extra person eating their way through your stuff, until starvation – or more likely, dehydration – kills you? Or are you in it for the long haul, hiding out for a bit and then trying to survive in the world?
What are you good at?
It’s likely that, coming out of the bunker, things won’t be the same. You can’t just search for information on the internet. How do I make my own solar panel? How do I grow food, treat my wounds, or decontaminate my clothes and drinking water? It’s going to be brutal, and for most things, you’ll just have to make it work with what you have. Just being able to work stuff out is probably the best Darwinian skillset. It’s what we’ve evolved to do – and doing it well, at a high level, in sub-ideal conditions should make you super successful in navigating the post-apocalyptic world. But in modernity, it’s a skillset that’s seldom rewarded.
That’s why my money is on people hiding out in back rooms with dirty fingernails, rather than the entitled few floating around in space. I’d rather try to survive the apocalypse with my local bike mechanic than with a harrowing cluster of egotistical maniacs on a rocket to nowhere.
For the first time in memory – at least for me – during the pandemic, bike mechanics were treated and paid properly. They were in high demand, and good ones were fiercely protected by the shops they worked for. Allowed space and time to fix things, isolated from customer service and bureaucracy, they thrived. With the tiniest hint of disaster, they became flavor of the month. In the apocalypse, mechanics, plumbers, farmers, and designers reign supreme, while soft-handed writers, correspondents, and spreadsheet jockeys wither and die.
I’d want Burf (Paul Burford of BTR Fabrications) in my bunker, or Ted James. I’d want Stuart from Bikefix, or Charlie from Seabass, or Sam from Stayer in my bunker. Because between us, we’d either kill each other (I’d be the one to go, for sure) or set up an irrigation system, grow vegetables, find other survivors, and make a small part of the world habitable. We’d make the best we could out of what we have. We’d work it out, one problem at a time.
Independent bike shops are like the customer service arm of the whole cycling industry, and a good relationship with a good, local independent shop changes the entire user experience of a bike. They’re the problem-solving elite. So, when presented with solving the problem of one bike for everything forever, it’s been super exciting to see the different avenues each has taken in exploring the dystopian fantasy of a “forever tour” in the not-too-distant future – surviving total societal collapse and God knows what else.
Bikefix
Bikefix, London’s second-oldest continuously running bike shop – and I believe the only one to have stayed in the same premises – used to be on Lamb’s Conduit Street but has since moved into its own back room due to a rent hike. A high-end wine shop now occupies what used to be the storefront. Access is via St James’s Passage. There’s a sign at the alleyway entrance pointing to the tucked-away workshop.
Stuart is… pretty weird. For almost a decade, I was convinced he hated me based on our brief encounters at the shop – until, for a while, I dated one of his employees, which led me to spend a chunk of time at Bikefix. That relationship was exceptionally short-lived, but Stuart and I have remained friends ever since. He sometimes comes off as rude and standoffish, especially to customers, and has zero appetite for nonsense. But at the same time, he’s an expert-level explorer of alternatives.
Alternatives to what? Oh… basically everything.
Bikefix stocked Brompton in the early ’90s, when no one cycled in London and Brompton was a nerdy brand for old weirdos. They also stocked Moulton, 8freight, one-off Mike Burrows prototypes, HPV Velotechnik recumbents, Airnimal and Circe tandems, and a bunch of other weird stuff that would make casual browsers or normal cyclists recoil in horror. It was the only shop in London that would stock spares for niche and redundant bikes. Need a bottom bracket for a Schlumpf drive? Bikefix has that. A seat pad for a racing recumbent? Go see Stuart.
Secretly, in a basement, Bikefix has long carried out all kinds of frame repairs and alterations in-house – like a proper bike shop from back in the day. For a while, they were home to framebuilder Sonic Cycles. The shop is now just a workshop, but they still do frame repairs, as well as bicycle repairs of all kinds. The walls are lined with useful things and esoteric junk from every weird niche that cycling has to offer. Stuart has recently started making his own clothes and whittling spoons – all useful apocalypse skills.
If I had to guess who’d be the most likely to either win or be disqualified from the BESPOKED Apocalypse Build Off, I’d put my redundant banknotes on Bikefix for sure. While I haven’t seen the full build yet, from my occasional visits, the Bikefix apocalypse build is shaping up to look like the oddball love child of a Lime bike and an agricultural vehicle from the 1700s. It seems improbable – an off-piste, oddball solution – but perhaps that makes it the most authentic response to a one-bike, post-societal problem.
Seabass
Seabass feels like the bike shop Jay and Silent Bob would have stood outside of instead of the Quick Stop – if Dante were a bike mechanic and Randal worked in a record shop. That’s not entirely fair; it’s cooler than that.
Lined with rad retro mountain bike builds and NJS track frames, and basically always playing some kind of sludgy doom, Seabass couldn’t be more the opposite of Bikefix. There’s a Persian rug, a sofa, and an eclectic stock of components from Allygn and Wizard Works, plus vintage stuff and new things. There’s a Stayer road bike built up and ready to go, and heaps of other esoteric bits and bobs you can’t find in “normal” bike shops.
I’ve known Charlie since the olden days, when he used to work at Brick Lane Bikes. I remember he sold me some trade-price deep-section carbon rims and rode over to where I worked at the time to drop them off. He told me, “It’s still a secret, don’t tell anyone, but I’m opening a shop!”
Coming up on 15 years later, I think Seabass (named after a dog) has moved shop twice and grown into basically the trendiest bike shop in town. Despite the trendy, sludgy doom vibes, the staple of business is normal servicing of normal bikes for normal people.
I poked around and took a few pictures, but their apocalypse build was hiding out in a friend’s framebuilding workshop. By the front door stands the Raleigh Fourty, a little tall bike that’s twice as good as the two Raleigh Twenties it’s made from. I love that everything at Seabass is pretty decent, but there’s no snobbery about the place. Seabass vibes would make a very chill bunker.
Stayer
Sam and Edit have been prolific in East London’s ever-changing cultural landscape. They previously ran Isumbards – a shop dedicated to importing and fixing up high-end vintage Belgian road bikes. Having been fixiemongers for a number of years, they moved a little further out of town to start Stayer.
Stayer has diversified into basically all the more involved stuff that most bike shops don’t do – high-end wheelbuilding, framebuilding, and repairs. More recently, they’ve been running framebuilding courses, where students can come in and build their own bike in a week. It’s not by any means an exhaustive program of education – instead, it’s a taster. It’s a little bit of each part of the process, with the focus on the process itself rather than design or fit.
On the course, students build Stayer’s Ritchey-inspired ATB – a modern take on a 650b bike for most things – or, if they’re really opposed to it, something else similar. Not only is the Stayer ATB a super cool bike, but in its design, the build is completed using a number of different techniques, giving students a bit of an overview of different ways to build – although it’s basically all fillet brazed.
The ATB would, at face value, be a perfect starting point for the Apocalypse Build Off. However, Sam – who is clearly a glutton for punishment – has instead built a gigantic and indestructible electric cargo bike, with a bed made from tubes covered in sheet steel to look like a Cybertruck (if a Cybertruck was actually made well). There’s one tube from an old Kona, but I think it’s the only one.
While I was there, Sam was mostly pilfering bits from other old projects stashed on top of ovens and under mezzanines – but with precision, knowing where each part was and having a plan for it ahead of time. The rate and ferocity of problem-solving was impressive. Each time a part of the process didn’t work, there was no phasing him – no pause, no head-scratching – just measured, linear progress, sidestepping obstacles and marching relentlessly onwards.
Also while I was there, I raided a pile of jumble things – from the bike jumble that Stayer also runs to clear out space – and pulled out some Dura-Ace track wheels for my FBM Sword and some Ingrid bits for another project. I think I’d be intimidated by having Sam in a bunker. He’s too nice and also too focused. I’d always be on edge, worrying that Sam was doing more than me and that I wasn’t pulling my weight.
I’m not sure that the Stayer apocalypse build strictly fits within the guidelines – but it’s increasingly being tailored towards its future life as a dog-carrying bike for a gigantic puppy, which gained three kilograms in the week between my visits to Stayer. I guess a giant dog would be useful after the apocalypse too?
The End is Nigh!
The Bespoked Apocalypse Build Off is, of course, a lot tongue-in-cheek and should be taken with a generous spoonful of salt. It reflects the mood not just within the cycling industry, but also outside it – in the UK and America, and I imagine in loads of other places too. Even worse, it reflects the reality of almost any kind of military activity. With the doomsday clock inching towards midnight, it’s important to take a load off every now and then – not to be so crippled and distraught by the weight of complex, large-scale global problems that you can’t poke fun at your own bad ideas with friends in a bike shop.
It’s important that however increasingly dehumanizing conditions become, our humanity and creativity don’t disappear in the way that empathy, honesty, and morality have. It’s important to get together in real life, and hang out, and do stupid and harmless things that no one needs nor asks for. It’s important to remember that Dada came from the trenches – and that in spite of all the atrocities humans inflict on the world and each other, there are still good bits in there that are worth building for.
I don’t know who’s going to win the ever-increasing prize bundle, but I do know that showing up, having a nice time, and making something stupid is a win for everyone involved.