By RUTH LA FERLA
In a city that elevates the pursuit of chic to stratospheric heights, voguish cyclists on vintage bikes are the new trend. From the Brooklyn Bridge to the Hudson River and from TriBeCa to Harlem, roadways are the new runways.
For style-obsessed cyclists, clutching BlackBerrys and clad not in spandex but in fluttery skirts, capes and kitten heels, their bicycles are no mere conveyance but a racy adjunct to their look. Their style, a modish amalgam of fashion and function, is documented on blogs , and their enthusiasm is fueling business.
George Bliss, who owns Hudson Urban Bikes in Greenwich Village, said they are far removed “from the image of the adult cyclist as infantry soldier with a helmet.” Mr. Bliss said that his clients tend to be women who almost invariably dress to impress.
“They want more things,” he said. “Fenders and baskets and chains and bells and things to carry their kids and their dogs.” The cyclists are “part of a movement,” said Julie Hirschfeld, the owner of Adeline Adeline, a boutique that sells bicycles, jaunty vintagestyle wicker baskets and canvas bags.
Their look, captured on Web sites like The Sartorialist and Bicycle Catwalk, as well as Cycle Chic from Copenhagen, is part of “that whole sort of blog style,” Ms. Hirschfeld said . A desire to look workday glamorous impelled Michelle Tillou, an art dealer, to ride to her gallery recently wearing a blazer, elasticized trousers and patentleather wedge-heel shoes. More often she slips on kitten heels.
“The better to hook onto the pedals,” she said. For the designer Lela Rose, wedgeheeled platforms and a khaki shirtdress of her own design are ideal for riding her custom tricycle. Ms. Rose and her cycling cohorts began appearing in Manhattan in significant numbers a couple of years ago, influenced perhaps by a handful of early adopters.
Not everyone is thrilled. Ross Autry, a blogger in Birmingham, Alabama, noted in an e-mail that multitasking bicyclists are too self-consciously hip for his taste and may pose a hazard. “Fixing your makeup or sending a text message could have catastrophic results,” he said. To say nothing of going without a helmet.
New York has become increasingly bike-friendly. Last year, the city completed 320 kilometers of bike lanes , according to Transportation Alternatives, a bicycle advocacy organization.
Ms. Morrison once planned an outfit to complement her chopper: a chambray shirt, flat sandals and a patterned ‘50s-inspired Prada skirt. “I saw myself as this very chic, carefree Parisian on a moped with an Hermes bag and the wind in my hair,” she said. The reality, however, was sobering. “At times, when I see my reflection in a shop window, I think, Oh, my God, I look like a 35-year-old on a child’s bike.” It’s an image that, she said, “I just have to put out of my mind.”
