Beautiful…
David A Smith – Sign Artist from Danny Cooke on Vimeo.
Tag: England
Monocle Magazine Store Visit
I “discovered” Monocle Magazine while living in Hamburg. As I was perusing my favorite bookstore there after work one day, I happened upon a new glossy – interesting title, bike wheel on the cover, quality paper, hmmm… I have a mistress and she has two wheels, so anything that is smartly bike related catches my attention. I sat down, read a little and fell in love. There were articles about bikes interspaced with design, global politics, a Japanese comic, well-designed fonts (I grow nerdier every day…), lifestyle, city profiles, travel, branding, craft and men’s accoutrements.
The premiere issue of Monocle was launched in February 2007 and the bike issue happened to be the third issue of the magazine. Monocle is headed by Tyler Brûlé, a Canadian-born journalist who also writes/wrote a good weekly editorial for the International Herald Tribune and has some serious chops as a journalist and writer: BBC, The Guardian, Stern, The Sunday Times, Vanity Fair, runs a design firm, and was shot by a sniper while covering the war in Afghanistan…
One of my guilty pleasures in life is buying Monocle Magazine at a specific magazine stand near “C” concourse at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport. Which sounds snobby, but I am SOOO unsnobby (except for coffee and beer…). It is just happenstance that for the last couple of years, I travel through Amsterdam every couple of months and it has coincided (give or take a week or two) with the release of each new issue. On one of my recent trips to England I got to spend an off-day in London. I made it a point to detour into the Marylebone neighborhood and into the first Monocle retail store (there are now five along with podcasts, a radio show and a TV spot on Bloomburg) to buy the most current issue. The shopping experience was great: small, but well stocked store, attentive staff, my purchased was wrapped like I was in a Tokyo stationary shop, and I had missed a visit by Tyler Brûlé by 20 minutes. The Monocle HQ is close by and he apparently stops in from time to time.
Film Friday – Brooks Saddlery
I hate breaking in a new leather bike saddle – hate. It takes a month of riding for it not to feel like some sort of 15th century Transilvanian torture device. When it finally does wear into place, there is nothing better on long slow rides. A properly broken-in and adjusted saddle makes back to back all day rides possible and enjoyable without any pain the next day. My favorite of all time was a 1970’s vintage Rolls that I got with when I traded a pair of skis for a time-trial bike in the 1990’s. It was like a soft calfskin glove for my butt. It died in a horrendous crash on a colorado mountain road – a crash that left me with some serious road rash and some broken fingers. When I replaced the bike and saddle, I put a Brooks B-17 (black) on my new stead. After the initial torture, it was a constant companion for about 10 years. It was heavier that most saddles, but I am not in the ounce counting club and a comfortable ride is worth POUNDS of added weight.
Below is a video of the Brooks factory tour. They still do it all by hand. Watching the video makes me want to buy an new one just because of its provenance.
Goodbye old friend…
I was home from England for 13 hours when my faithful truck, Early, breathed his last bit of misted 87 octane unleaded gas. We were driving together to check out an advert for tools on Craigslist in Belleview, WA when his little transmission gave out on him after 278,482 miles. A rebuilt one, if I put it in myself, was $1200 and I decided it was time to let him go.
Early wasn’t pretty. He was dark green and rust, had a flat bed with wooden sides, and an interior only a mother could love. More than once people thought I had arrived somewhere to mow their lawn or haul away their junk. No one would park beside him in parking lots and when he and I changed lanes on the freeway, people got the hell out of our way.
Instead of being shinny, he was useful and I can give no higher praise to a truck than that. He moved us and everything we owned from our old house to our new one, always started the first time, hauled trees and crap to the dump countless times, took me to work when Stamps-With-Foot and I couldn’t carpool, served as a loaner when friends were in town, hauled lumber, gear, bikes, furniture, appliances, dirt, and most recently he delivered 1.5 tons of gravel for our hot tub base, though it did take him 5 trips…
I hope he can be as useful in death as he was when running. Maybe his steel bed, frame, and engine will be melted down and made into a bridge, a ship, or a building. Goodbye trusty old friend. Thank you.
Elementary…
Sherlock Holmes has become an everyday occurrence in my life. Last year my wife and I read a few of the Laurie King/Mary Russell books. She got The House of Silk and The Sherlockian for Christmas. I have started re-reading all the original Doyle stories and last, but not least… Sherlock Holmes is now a draftsman at my J-O-B. No really, I work with a man who’s actual real legal name, given at birth, is Sherlock Holmes. I wanted to hire the guy from the milli-second that I saw the heading of his resume, but he is actually a fantastic draftsman and a great asset.
Anyway, I have been and will be spending more than a little time in London and England in general this year and on my most recent trip I happened to find myself on Baker Street in London. Well, far be it from me to miss a weird travel opportunity. The wife and I walked down to the Sherlock Holmes “Museum” near the Baker Street tube stop and took the tour. We enjoyed the aside in our busy day and hammed it a photo-op. Stamps-With-Foot makes a pretty little Watson…
London Cycling
Many a fine two-wheeled mistress have I, yet I am burdened with an oft wandering eye… Last week in London I spent way too muck time ogling bicycles. Locked up outside a store on the sidewalk, hung in shop windows, rolling down the street… of all the cycles that caught my eye, the Bramptons that scurried about were the most quintessentially English. I don’t think that I have ever seen a folding bike locked up here in the US, but it was common place in london, though that might be due to the killer bike racks…
