Sitting pretty on a dollar-signs bicycle designed to dazzle

PARIS: Bicycles with alligator skin saddles, frames adorned with 24-carat gold leaf, or just two wheels designed to your own personal specifications.

From Paris to Tokyo by way of Milan, designer and customised bikes costing thousands of dollars are the latest must-have items coveted by urban elites in search of “pedal chic”.

A world away from the bland utilitarianism of selfservice bikes, these top-end cy- cles are becoming as much a status symbol as the car ever was.

Whether the buyers are trendy young professionals or big names in the business world, designers are competing to woo them with their sleek, luxury models.

Luxury firm Hermes, which specialises in leather goods, is one of the market’s leading players. Its Flaneur model comes with a € 9 000 (R125 000) price tag.

For that, deep-pocketed cyclists get a designer name, eight gears, a carbon monobloc frame and water-resistant Taurillon leather saddle and handlebar grips.

“This bike is successful with regular Hermes customers... and with cycling enthusiasts, who find something new in it,” says Francois Dore, the director-general of Hermes Horizons.

“We wanted to set out our vision of cycling as the favourite means of transport for the modern citizen.”

On the other side of the Alps, bespoke bike company 43 Milano turned to Pininfarina, the Italian car design and coachbuilding fir m, for its Fuoriserie model. The chrome steel bike, priced at € 8 400, has a discreet electric motor on the back wheel and is inspired by one of the firm’s 1930s cars. Its limited edition of 30 is aimed at “bosses who live in city centres”. – Sapa-AFP