Build Your Own Bamboo Bike
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Photo courtesy of Bamboo Bike Studio
Strong. Light. Flexible. Renewable. Bamboo is a great choice for bike frames and at the Bamboo Bike Studio in Brooklyn, NY cyclists can build their own custom bamboo bike. In addition to bike-building workshops, the studio advances sustainable entrepreneurship and self-propelled transportation worldwide by working with partner organizations to establish scalable bamboo bike factories in countries such as Ghana, Kenya, and Ecuador.
Bamboo is an ideal material for light-industrial business in developing countries due to its build-ability (working steel and aluminum requires the skills of a master welder, and shaping carbon is a highly technical process); performance (bamboo is hollow and lightweight, yet strong enough to take the rigours of cycling); and sustainability (it grows quickly in a variety of climates and requires no refineries, smelting, or long-distance shipping).
