Velo City: Bicycle Culture and City Life

Kinfolk Autumn

John Buellen's Kinfolk

This is actually the second time we’ve featured this bike – it’s owner is John Buellen, one of the founders of Kinfolk. His frame is now one year old, and he brought The Prime’s Will Goodan in to capture it’s first birthday.

It seems that, increasingly, there’s a resurgence of emphasis on the hand made or home grown. No matter what sector: from the ingredients we cook with, to the clothes we wear, to the bikes we ride. It’s a theme I’ve been reminded of more and more during this year. John’s Kinfolk is a fine example of why this is so. In terms of the bikes featured on The Spoken: there’s a certain fascination with the sight of a pristine, studio-shot bike, but there’s something infinitely more absorbing about a bike that has developed it’s own personality from being used. It’s an after-market accessory you can’t buy at your local bicycle boutique. Chips and wear don’t spray-on, you have to live it. Every day. Rain or shine. It’s a quality that makes a hand made frame so appealing, and what sets them apart from the myriad cookie-cutter bikes on this planet.

John describes it aptly: “Its been a little over a year since I started to ride this set up. I haven`t changed a thing (although I do eventually want to change out the seat post). It still rides like it should and (as you can see) all the leather parts have worn in nicely. I am a firm believer in using whatever it is you own and the more you use, it inevitably becomes an extension of you. A friend recently told me that a grandparent of theirs had owned and still wore the same pair of leather boots for over 40 years, and this was a common way of thinking not less than a half century ago. We as consumers need to think less about so easily throwing away that which we needn’t have bought in the first place and more about holding onto that which we eventually, will hold dear”.

John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk
John Buellen's Kinfolk