- BEN’S BESPOKE DISC BRAKE ETAP ROAD BIKE - 

Ben approached me looking for a nice disc brake road bike and wanted the obvious amazing ride quality, a perfect fit, clean lines and some custom features. Ben is creative director at MR PORTER, so I knew from the very start he would have some good ideas in mind.

First of all, we spoke about the frame feature. He really wanted to explore the integrated seat post, it’s such a good way to get some extra colour on there rather than the standard black carbon seat post, it requires precise measuring and is truly made to measure, that said, there are a few millimetres of adjustment to play with should you need to. The only problem he was up against was that he didn’t like any of the readily available ISP toppers. Here’s where I come in. Between myself, Broady and Mark Bentley, we machined a few parts which I was able to mitre, file, manipulate, weld and braze into a stunning stainless steel seatpost topper. It’s the first time I have built a custom topper so it was a super fun little project for me. With a tapered and ovalized toptube, tapered headtube and Spirit HSS downtube, I was able to keep the lines on this bike flowing super smooth, whilst maintaining stiffness down at the BB and focussing on comfort everywhere else.

Onto the paint. Ben had some great ideas, but we were really struggling to come up with a way to create 3D effect and shadows whilst keeping my branding consistent. I spoke to Jack and let him speak to Ben direct and it triggered a little idea in my mind. I have read about a company in the USA who do a ‘Surprise Me’ paint job, however I suggested we flipped that idea and instead of the surprise being for the customer, it would be on me. So, welcome to the very first paint job I had precisely no impact on. I knew Ben could be trusted to not put me in tears, but I also knew for a fact Jack would pull it out of the bag for me as he has a ton of ideas floating around and is always suggesting things we should try. It’s safe to say they didn’t disappoint.

The new 3D graphics are available as an extra on all Feather Bicycles going forward and have already featured on a number in the last couple of months since it’s introduction.