Inspired by this deep gloss read saddle from Beast in Dresden (who also provided the Beast stem), Allied figured out how to mimic the depth and reflection with layers and layers of translucent, tinted clear coats and plain clear coats, yet only adds about 20g more than a regular paint job.
They don’t yet have a name for this finish, and it’ll be a couple months before it’ll be an option for a very reasonable $300 upcharge.
Check them out here, and watch our Factory Tour video to see how the bikes are made from scratch.
PARLEE CYCLES
Parlee wasn’t showing any new bikes, instead using their booth to showcase the amazing work their in-house paint team can do. We were impressed many years ago when we toured their facility, and things have only gotten better. This digital green shows the insane masking they can do if you’re willing to pay for it…
The TTR show bike exemplifies even more masking combined with sparkle paint and fades. It’s easy to overlook the amount of time and talent something like this takes to produce until you really start to dissect the process.
Ever the tinkerers with carbon, Parlee’s team decided they didn’t like the unfinished look of an open dropout, so they made carbon covers for their custom builds. It’s bonded in, and not likely to be something offered aftermarket, but pretty cool.
Really, this display is just something to start the conversation. They can paint virtually anything you can imagine. Check ’em out at ParleeCycles.com.
ENIGMA BICYCLE WORKS
Enigma took home two awards, and it’s no surprise one of them was for Best Finish. This bike’s paint had layers of details behind layers of clear coat gloss, with no component spared the custom treatment.
All of the Campy parts were still 100% functional, something that surprised the component group’s rep (we caught them talking about this bike as we were photographing it).
This one was inspired by famous English open wheel race teams:
They weren’t showing any all-new models, but they’ve made subtle tweaks to their frames. The steel tubeset is now a lighter mixture of Columbus Spirit up front and Zona in the back. In a “gravel bike” build, it’ll fit a 650×52 or 700×42 tire with multi mount cable management that makes it easy to run clean 1x, 2x or electronic drivetrains without extra cable stops cluttering things up. They’re also working on a Ti disc road bike.
This classy UK theme mixed white paint with masked polished sections to add detail. It took home the Best Campagnolo Build trophy. Hit them up at EnigmaBikes.com.
