Editing the cityscape
Posted June 24th, 2006 in The Desk
Velorution posts on an interesting proposition.
When one parks a bicycle on the street, one is adding to and editing the cityscape. That implies a responsibility: the public duty to make the public realm attractive, by parking a beautiful bicycle. Just as we don’t think it is appropriate to go to a nice restaurant dressed in dirty clothing, we should feel ashamed to leave an ugly bike locked on a lamp post, because we are spoiling everyone else’s experience of walking down the street.
Controversial and somewhat elitist to be sure, but I think she’s on to something.
Roadies are pretty pedantic about their presentation. From them, you’ll usually see a neat and fastidiously well maintained bicycle that looks fast just leaning up against the wall at the cafe. Their elegant and sleek bikes do turn heads and add to our space.
MTN bikers, or those punks that like to engage in a bit of urban road kill also have a style of their own, riding machines outfitted with riser bars, chunky rubber and heavy duty suspension. Let’s face it, their bikes look like two wheeled Hummer H1’s ready for Desert Storm, and with the current fashion for military irony in street wear, highly appropriate to our times, their bikes bring a heavy industrial look to our streetscapes.
Then there is the great mass of cyclists out there that have a totally different take on the style stakes - not haute coutre, not even pret-a-porter. It’s something else. In many ways their rides represent the current fashion for retro, re-cycled, handmade and hand-me-down objects. In this way they do have something to say about the sanitising of our public space.
Of course beauty in our public space is in the eye of the beholder, and you could stretch that further to the old adage of not knowing much about art, but knowing it when you see it. Still, I agree with Andrea, a nice, clean, well maintained bike just looks damn good lying around, - of course they look even better at speed, which says more about cycling that anything else.
Technorati Tags: cycling, bicycles, urban, public, space, style
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