The Show Man
The founder of the Bespoked UK Handmade Bike Show, Phil Taylor, casts an eye back over the last decade of framebuilding – including his own
Phil Taylor is one of those people for whom there seems to be more hours in the day, and more petrol in the tank, than everyone else. Originally a PE teacher, he worked as a behavioural specialist at a school in Brighton, where with wife Tessa and friends Sarah Young and Jon Tutton he founded the Brighton Art Fair in 2003 – in his spare time.
He has since retrained as a psychotherapist, but along the way he added the bowstring ‘framebuilder’, a skill that still keeps him busy. On top of all this he also somehow found the time to create Bespoked, which together with America’s NAHBS is the West’s most prestigious handmade bike show. So how did it all begin?
‘I’d ride part way along the South Downs to work so I used a mountain bike. But there were road sections and it was slow,’ says Taylor. ‘So I thought, “What do I need?” It would be like a cyclocross bike but would have to be comfortable for more than an hour. So I guess I designed a gravel bike – though I’m not saying I invented gravel bikes!’ That led Taylor to enrol on a parttime welding course, and in 2009 he built his first frame. But if you’re serious about framebuidling it takes more than a certificate in Tig-welding. You need some advice. You need to start meeting other framebuilders…
Nose against glass
‘There was a framebuilder where I grew up, Bob Griffin, whose workshop was a room in his terraced house. I’d go in with my friends and we lusted after these bikes, but we could never afford one.
‘I was always aware of framebuilders, but even when I started building years later, information was really hard to find. There was a new breed emerging though, like Ted James and Tom Warmerdam at Demon, and I used to ask them questions like how do you cut your seatstays?’
Taylor used to just call or visit builders to ask for tips and tricks, and even sometimes got actual physical labour – Warmerdam reamed the seat tube on Taylor’s first frame. It was at this point that Taylor realised he was tapping into a new and growing community, and he got thinking all over again.
‘My wife’s background is in fine art and we had an artist couple, Jon and Sarah, who were friends. We all went to a pub one day in Brighton – they were gearing up to go to the Affordable Art Fair in London – and we got talking. Brighton is full of artists so why don’t we put on a fair here? We got in touch with the Corn Exchange, put down a deposit, sent applications out to artists and did the first show. Just like that. Jon and Sarah still run it, and they do Made Brighton as well.
‘It was a lesson – build it and they will come. So when I started getting into framebuilding I thought why not do the same thing we did with the art fair? There are good people making good stuff, and people will come to see it.’
Thus on Saturday 11th June 2011 the UK’S first handmade bike show was held in Bristol. The first year was such a success that in 2012 a larger venue had to be found, which took Bespoked to its spiritual home in Brunel’s Old Engine Shed next to Bristol Temple Meads train station. The perfect platform one might think for the show’s owner/operator to market his brand, Libertine Bicycles.
‘The show is the problem! I have exhibited a few times but I can’t do it properly and run the show. The first year I slept in the venue overnight because I felt personally responsible for all the bikes. My framebuilding has suffered because of organising the show – they’re two full-time jobs.’
It would appear the priority list is working out OK, however. Taylor still builds a number of Libertines each year – such this one, Taylor’s personal, 7.2kg Fast Road bike – while Bespoked is about to celebrate its 10th birthday.
Family man
A decade is a long time, so what has Taylor seen change down the years?
‘Everything, yet the heart and soul is the same. I think the bread and butter of UK framebuilding is still the traditional high-mileage bike, bought by the older clientele that still appreciates having a steel bike made for you. But we’ve seen a new wave of builders emerge: Matthew Sowter at Saffron, Ricky Feather, Tom Donhou, builders who want to make custom bikes competitive with modern bikes. Ricky and Tom even sponsor race teams. Then there are people like Dear Susan doing crazy things [a bike with a brake-operated whoopee cushion being one]; Winter Cycles and Ted James, Demon, all with incredible ideas.’
It’s true enough. Avid watchers of the handbuilt scene won’t fail to have noticed disc brakes appearing long before the mainstream, so too wide tyres, bikes with luggage, 3D-printed parts, custom paint. So who has impressed Taylor most?
‘I couldn’t possibly answer that. That’s like asking which one of my children do I like most! Anyway, the show is about uniting people. It brings all the clans of cycling together, and that’s what I like most.’
Bespoked 2021, 15th-17th October, Harrogate. See bespoked.cc for details
‘The first year I slept in the venue overnight because I felt personally responsible for all the bikes. My framebuilding has suffered’