Some of you may recall the On The Horizon we did with Shape Bicycles a few months back. Shape is a fresh BMX brand from France that freelance product designer Sylvain Taro started up to fill that void for originality and quality craftsmanship he felt most products were missing these days. In the interview, he talked about doing something slightly different that most brands aren’t doing. A signature bar end for one of his riders. All right, so bar ends are pretty simple, how could they do anything different? Well, they did manage to do something a little different and it’s the fact that they put time and effort into something that most brands these days are mass producing as a plastic plug with their logo on it.
The other day he sent through a few photos of the final version for me to check out. I figured it would be pretty cool to give you guys a closer look at this one…
Sylvain and I had a pretty good email conversation going about all the different aspects of doing something that is pretty simple, but still fairly complex. I figured I’d put together a little write up of the whole process.
So, the idea for doing a signature bar end all started when Sylvain was talking to his team rider, Bruno Abriven. They tossed around a bunch of ideas and obviously they landed on the idea of doing an original bar end that didn’t suck. Which, if you look around during a session these days, is heavily favored by the simple rubber plug that is highly disposable.
Once they started getting things rolling with the idea of going the classic route of doing a metal bar end, they decided they wanted to make it as clean and simple as they could. In the processes, they decided to go a slightly different route with the internal expanding area and use a rubber body. This helps grip the inside of the bar better than plastic and allows for the clean look they were going for.
If you haven’t noticed yet, Shape is pretty influenced by the 5 branch design. Sylvain and Bruno both decided it would be cool to take that 5 branch design, which Shape also used on their sprocket, and use it for the outside of the bar end. If you think about it, this ended up being pretty cool since it’s even more like the original wheel the bolt goes through the center like an axle… a very large axle, haha.
After they decided on the design, Sylvain took it to his machinist, who actually lives just down the road from him in Brittany and they worked out how to produce it just as they had planned. Now, I get pretty psyched on the whole idea of “Made in America” because it generally means quality because brands are able to work very closely with the people making the products to make sure it is coming out right. I don’t think Sylvain could get any closer to this than having the actual machines in his place with this route, so “Made in France” works for me.
After a few months of trying out different samples, the one you see in the photos is the final version. Real simple, real clean and I’m sure will last you longer than most of the parts on your bike. You can pick this up in the raw silver for 18.90€ or about $25.00 U.S. Which, yeah, it’s definitely more expensive than those plastic bar ends that go for around $3 or $4, but I think the quality can justify the price. Obviously, these aren’t for the rider on a budget, but if you take pride in having quality and unique parts on your bike and support rider owned brands, this is definitely something to look into. If you are looking to get your hands on a set here in the U.S, or have questions hit Sylvain up directly at sylvain.taro@gmail.com.
You can find out more about Shape at Shape-Bicycles.fr
