My new old road bike

Tiago, I know you've been waiting anxiously, so for you and everyone: here is my new, old, elegant bicycle for sport. It's the copper bike on top, a Raleigh Interational. This is the bike I will ride from country inn to country inn on vacation with my husband, who rides the red Pinarello. This is the bike I will ride when going several towns over. This is the elegant sporty club(wo)man bicycle which will be perfect for me after our Randonneur-type conversion and slight modernization.



This new bike was handmade in Carlton, England in August of 1974. It is Reynolds 531 throughout with chromed Nervex lugs, chrome stays, chromed fork. Full vintage Campagnolo (except brakes, which I intend to modernize anyway). The frame has a geometry somewhere between sport and touring, and is part of the inspiration for modern bikes like those sold by Rivendell but this one is recycled, with vintage flair, and some modernization challenges/opportunities. I can't ever do things the easy way anyhow.

I will hold on to my French road bicycle (a Courtois) because of the memories and because it is the bike that got me into cycling. It wouldn't fetch enough to be worth selling if I wanted to, which I don't. I'm a little sad that it won't be in full rotation anymore, but we knew when we bought it quickly in Paris that it was too small, but we had places to go and see and wanted to get on the road. I'm not getting any shorter for a long time yet (I hope!) so the new bike will be much easier on my back and knees. Plus it's pretty enough to hang on our living room wall as functional art.

On the fashion side, I tend to wear aquas, blues, and greens, and I thought the copper bike would complement my wardrobe nicely. I'm such a girl.

Where to store your bicycle?

New York Times, Wednesday, March 13, 1898

A Cabinet for the Bicycle
A Combination Bookcase-Bicycle Arrangement with a Strip of Carpet to Wheel Over.

It has every mark of Yankee ingenuity, but there isn't a bit of it in it. It is a bicycle cabinet warranted not to reveal its secret nature to the closest observer, and it is an English invention. The cabinet part of it is ingenious, but the should-be Yankee part is a strip of carpet which can be pulled out at one side and then wound up again with a crank, and when the carpet is out full length the bicycle can be rolled into the room - best parlor, if need be - upon it without injury to the most delicate floor covering.

The cabinet is a bookcase as long and as high as the bicycle. The three lower shelves are bona fide and books can be placed upon them, though they are narrow, but the upper, with the exception of where the carpet crank is, is a sham. Back of it the handlebars go when the bicycle is rolled in at the end, through a door which opens at the side of the cabinet and behind the book shelves.

Where the upper shelf would be in the bookcase there is a long piece of beveled class mirror set in with two short curtains hanging as if over books on either side. At the right side, the end where the wheel goes into the cabinet, the curtain hides a sham shelf, but there is a genuine one at the other end, and in the compartment is the carpet winding crank.

The cabinet is a good thing for the bicycle, which is kept out of the dust, but as for appearances the ordinary bicyclist has usually no objection to having a wheel in plain sight, whether it is in parlor, dining room, or hall.

Things haven't changed much since 1898. I'm an ordinary bicyclist and I have no objection to a wheel in plain sight, even in my best parlor. However I don't have anywhere near the number of bikes stored at the home above!

I find it fun to see what other people do in the Flickr Bike House pool.

Where do you store your bicycle(s)?