A friend of mine who is a bicycle aficionado recently created what is probably one of the most thoughtful birthday gifts I’ve ever encountered. In combining the two most important aspects of his life – cycling and his girlfriend, Maya –, Stu Campbell created a custom-assembled and handpainted masterpiece.
I interviewed Stu about the production, and Maya about her reaction. Here’s the lowdown about Maya Bankovic’s sick new ride:
northpublik: What was the impetus behind such a gift? Why not just a regular bike?
stu campbell: I have been riding in the city for over ten years and introduced Maya to city riding this past summer. She instantly loved it, even though she was either riding a friend’s bike significantly inferior to mine or my over-engineered mountain bike which was a little big and uncomfortable for her to ride. A difference of a couple centimetres here and there on a bike can really make an unbelievable difference in efficiency and enjoyment. So we spoke quite a bit about fit and what kind of bike she would buy for herself. I didn’t want a “regular or store bought bike” because, while I could get the fit right I would always have to make concessions regarding the overall look of the bike and quality of the parts. For example, a bike that fit the aesthetic criteria would have most of the right parts but the grips wouldn’t match the frame color or I didn’t like the pedals or the bike store had hidden a cheap freewheel in it etc. so rather than conceding even the smallest amount, and replacing the odd part, I just built it from scratch and chose every single part on the bike.
np: Where did you find the pieces for the bike?
sc: All the bike parts were purchased from catalogues that Vince, the owner of The Bike Clinic, has at his store [it's the second bike he has built for me. He built my fixed gear Peugeot earlier in the year]. I used the same ones when building my bike at the beginning of the summer.
np: What type of bike is it?
sc: It is a single speed road conversion, which means the frame,—an early 80’s bianchi—was part of a road bike [the kind you see Lance Armstrong riding], a bunch of gears, drop handlebars, etc. that was converted into a much simpler single speed drive system. It is like the bike most of us rode as kids, but it has a free wheel. meaning one can pedal backwards freely, hence the front and rear brakes. The bikes we had as kids used coaster brakes, wherein pedaling backward activated the rear brake.
np: How many separately purchased pieces are there?
sc: Everything is separate. I bought frame and fork together. Seat separate. Stem, handlebars, pedals, brake cable, levers, calipers, bottom bracket, free wheel, cogs, crank, wheels, the rear wheel is hand built, tires, seatpost, chain, brake pads, handgrips. I chose every part on the bike.
np: How long did the assembly take?
sc: The frame was in the shop for two weeks. most of that was just hiding from maya while waiting for parts to arrive. it probably took a day maybe two with the wheel build to hook it up totally.
np: Did you have the art style already in mind from the beginning?
sc: When I bought the frame from some dude in Etobicoke off craigslist, I had no idea where the project was going. He had sandblasted and grinded the frame clean, including grinding off all cable holders to give it a really clean look. He also put a coat of primer and one thin coat of white car paint on the frame. This white paint made me think of how people when they break an arm or something get their casts signed. So I thought it would be cool to have her friends and family represented somehow. And through conversations with the artist, the idea evolved.
np: Who was the artist?
sc: Nadia Tan, a friend and housemate of Maya’s.
np: How did you collect all the info about Maya’s life? Why choose these specific events/objects to represent?
sc: Nadia did that, we decided that we would ask four of her friends plus her mom and her sister to contribute ideas. So in that sense it is a little bit of a lilith fair concert. And Nadia did that over the phone. Once we had the ideas it was a question of which ones could be represented on the bike. For example, Maya and I first made out in an old convent when we were working on the werewolf movie, The House Next Door, and I wanted the convent represented, but I didn’t have any pics of it. It didn’t really look like a convent “should” anyway, and we couldn’t think of a way to do it and make it look good. So we left it off, however, Nadia was able to draw a werewolf which looks awesome.
np: How long did the art take?
sc: To actually apply the art took four days. But not full days; Nadia would take breaks from the film she was editing and work 10-30 minutes at a time.
np: How closely did you work with Nadia?
sc: Once we had the general concept down, I let her do her thing. Aside from my beautiful singing voice I have few artistic abilities. We had three or four meetings, then spoke on the phone a few times.
np: How was the art drawn on? How is it protected?
sc: The frame has a can of white rattle can paint on it. Then the art done in sharpie and rattle can black “oil based” then 10 coats of clear.
np: What locks did you get for this masterpiece?
sc: Due to a lack of space Maya must leave it on her patio, so for that we got four feet of the biggest link chain we could find and a giant padlock. I had to stand on the bolt cutter to cut the chain at the hardware store. For around town she has the standard u lock, and when we leave our bikes out for extended periods of time, i.e. seeing a movie, we use her u lock and my two u locks and a cable lock to link the bikes together to a post or whatever. About $400 worth of locks. Together they weigh about the same as her bike: 22lbs.
np: What will you do if Igor or his cohorts get their hands on it?
sc: Hopefully Igor will be in he clink. I’d like say I’d get revenge on those mofo’s, but the reality is if it is stolen, we’ll just have to build another one.
np: Anything else you’d like to mention?
sc: I had Nadia leave the underside of the bike empty so that I could write personal things to Maya. I didn’t want her riding around like some dork with “happy birthday” or “i love you” written on the side of her bike.
Tying all of the images together is a “subway map” lines and nodes. Maps are a point of interest for Maya and her family, and a nod to her coffee cup with the Paris underground map on it and her piggy bank with the NYC underground on it.
It was a surprise present so I hade to keep it secret from her for about two months. Which meant hiding the frame in closets and the bike store plus hoping all the co-conspirators could keep it secret. The bike shop is equidistant of my apt. and Maya’s and we’d pass it on the way to each other’s place. For two weeks when we would be walking together we would pass the frame hanging in the window and I would have a nervous little giggle to myself.
Maya’s response to her gift:
As cliché as it sounds, I was stunned. There was this beautiful, immaculate shiny thing sitting in the middle of the living room, it was perfect. I loved the design immediately, and how stark and bold the black and white is. Stu and Nadia were perceptive enough to pick up on the fact that I love the aesthetic of maps (I hadn’t even realized this, but it’s true). So the concept behind it is a subway map through somebody’s subconscious. I understood it right away and was in awe of how creative they are. What was even more shocking was seeing drawings of my mom’s various traditional meals on the frame, alongside childhood stuffed animals, jokes from my angsty teenage years and obscure memories from travel destinations. I feel so lucky to be riding a piece of art around the city.
I get a lot of double takes at red lights, no comments but quite a few stare-downs and gazes kind of following it as they pass. This bike is cooler than I am, that’s for sure.
Toronto being the bike city that it is, chock full of aluminum, carbonfibre and standard paint colours, it’s nice to see real ownership taking place over personal property that can often be too anonymous. Sure, there are the few bikes with baskets adorned with silk flowers, or those that have traditional “custom” paint jobs — a colour or two of shiny paint — but this is one that completely stands out, a real one-of-kind piece of art.
So if you happen to see happy Maya striding around on her designer wheels, take a quick, good look. She may be a streak of black and white, pedaling fast to reach her man.
photo cred: all photos courtesy Maya Bankovic
