History Makers: Bianchi

In the first of a new series, Cyclist unearths the bicycles that helped shape the industry’s most celebrated brands

In the first of a new series, Cyclist unearths the bikes that made the industry’s greatest brands

What better place to start hunting down forgotten gems than the oldest marque in the game? Founded in Milan by Edoardo Bianchi, the Italian company lays claim to being the longest surviving name in the business, with a heritage dating back to 1885. Over its 133-year history it has won pretty much every race going, with riders such as Fausto Coppi, Felice Gimondi, Marco Pantani, Mario Cipollini and Jan Ullrich, and is still notching up victories today with the Lottonl-jumbo team.

Bianchi’s pedigree is as rich as its bikes are diverse, so when Cyclist visited the Bianchi factory on the outskirts of Treviglio in northern Italy, we needed someone who knows their tubing, and luckily we found him: creative director and de facto bike curator Fabio Belotti, an employee of 41 years who has worked on some of Bianchi’s most famous bikes. Here he talks us through just a small selection of its vast back catalogue, but before he leads us to a secret lock-up in a disused part of the factory, he decides we need a brief history lesson about the one thing that has united the company’s bikes through the ages. Well, nearly.

‘Everyone thinks of Bianchi as the “Celeste” company, but once upon a time our bicycles only came in one colour: black. The first ones we found in Celeste are from 1912. Our legend is that Edoardo Bianchi took inspiration for the Celeste colour from the eyes of Queen Margherita, who he was teaching to ride a bicycle. Over the years the colour has changed from a little more green to a little more blue. In 1990 we created the official pantone CK, and in 2016 I created the slightly more fluorescent CK16. But even though the colour is always changing, for every Bianchi rider it has always been the same. All thanks to Edoardo.’