We're Back and We Mean to Bling!

As Sydney Rides Festival (and Summer) rolls around again, so do we....

October 13 marks the start of two weeks of bike fun in Sydney and we'll be in Sydney Park to help kick it off with some recycled bling for your bike.

So Cycle Chic Kids, young and old, stop on by and get crafty with us - your bike will thank you!

Cycle Chic Kids do WOOP! - AGAIN!

Come for an afternoon of bicycle crafty goodness this Saturday for the 2nd annual WOOP! celebration of bikes.  The official launch of the Sydney Rides Festival.

We'll be in Wimbo Park opposite Bourke Street Bakery from 12-4 going craft crazy.
Come and join us for some bike bling fun - it's not just for kids!!!

cLOVEerlicious.....

Chic at Any Age

Just brilliant.  More Everleigh Market gorgeousness.  Great to see older riders around so much lately too - and what is age anyway?  Just a number right?
It reminds me of this brilliant campaign from the City of Sydney that gets cheers every time it's aired publicly.

A Whole Lot of Chic Fun in the Sun

I love a Cycle Chic Kids event - happiness reigns and we get to play with ribbons and weird craft and funk up bicycles and scooters all day - usually helped along by some wicked cakes from the local school - what could be better.
So thanks to the manic cake bakers from Newtown Public School and those caramel kisses.... holy moly....

Oh yeah we upcycled some pretty bikes too and the kids (and adults) went away smiling - happy days.

     

     

Thanks too to lovely Lord Mayor Clover Moore, Carolyn, Michelle and the crew from City of Sydney for another glorious day and gorgeous Kerry for all your brilliant help and of course Mr Chic for the fully sustainable cycle chic kids extra cycle event transport and everything else :-)

And we couldn't do these gigs without the crazy inspiration from the recycle folks at Reverse Garbage...

More Cycle Chic Kids stuff here and email us if you want to be on our mailing list for future events.
More pics here on flickr.

Cycle Chic Kids Go West!

We're excited to be getting out of the Eastern Suburbs this Saturday and taking the Cycle Chic Kids bike magic on the road again!

       

Lord Mayor Clover Moore will be officially opening four beautifully revitalised community spaces over in Erskineville and we'll be setting up shop in Lillian Fowler Reserve between 11 and 1 on Saturday 5 November so come on down and say hi - bring your kids and their bicycles and get crafty with us.

Cycle Chic Kids is all about getting kids excited about riding by getting them to bling up their bikes using recycled or repurposed materials.  You may have seen us at the WOOP Bourke Street Festival earlier this year and we do love to bling bikes..... little kids and big "kids" welcome!!

More info here.

Everything's Connected - Caroline

And the fourth in the series of films from the City of Sydney, celebrating the diversity of Sydney's riders.

Great to get a shout out from our friend Mark over at IBikeLondon too.

Everything's Connected - Anthony

More bike goodness... and cute dad commuting....

Everything's Connected - Kitiya

The gorgeous Kit from Three Point Turnz picking outfits to go with her bike? LOVE IT!

Everything's Connected - Les & Judy

We love the City of Sydney's new bike films - lovely little snapshots of citizen cyclists doing their thing.
Have to say it's making me yearn for those long summer months of bike fun...

WOOP - The Movie!

The WOOP Festival to celebrate the Bourke Street Cycle Way was a day that will stay with all who attended for a while.  It was a day that heralded a new Sydney, a safer biking Sydney and a community spirit that I heard on the day compared to Sydney during the Olympics.

So here's a little reminder thanks to the City of Sydney, cause we can never get enough of happy citizen cyclists.

Bourke Street - it's only the start of it.

Get Your Craft On Cycle Chic Kids!

Just one more sleep to go to the much anticipated WOOP Rolling Festival on Bourke Street and we're excited!

We have piles of wonderful recycled craft generously donated by Reverse Garbage and Opera Australia.

Gorgeous lucky dip giveaways for all crafty kids thanks to supporters Gazelle Australia & CycleStyle and a FETE STALL!
(It's my first fete stall, forgive me for my joy!)

     

Our team of BRILLIANT Crafty Upcyclers will be on hand to help you make art out of your bikes and then on to the beautiful cycle way you go!

It's going to be a gorgeous day - stop by and say hi (even you big kids) and grab some ribbon for your handlebars.... go on you know you want to :-)

We'll be in Wimbo Park on Bourke Street (opposite Devonshire Street) between 11-3 on Sunday 15th!

Cycle Chic Kids are go!!

Cycle Chic Kids Do WOOP!

It's been a long time coming but the kids are ready to roll again!

We're very pleased to be presenting the next Cycle Chic Kids event as part of the wonderful WOOP! Rolling Bourke Street Festival Extravaganza on Sunday May 15.

This well-overdue celebration of the Bourke Street Cycle Way is morphing in to a fabulous community festival with all sorts of things planned - live entertainment, a vintage bike exhibit, kids activities, street entertainers, bikes and MORE BIKES and a mega raffle to raise money for the Cancer Council NSW initiative "Do Your Thing."

Events will stretch the length of the Cycle Way from Waterloo to Woolloomooloo and riders are encouraged to ride the loop and show the local businesses (and Sydney!) some bicycle love.  It's time.

Cycle Chic will be situated in Wimbo Park (opposite Devonshire Street) from 11am-3pm, along with Bourke Street Public School and their sausage sizzle.

We are inviting all children (and their carers) to bring their bikes and join in the craft fun with us and our team of wonderfully creative upcyclers.  We'll provide all manner of recycled bits and bobs for you to play with (feel free to bring some bits from your craft box too) and we'll help you to turn your bikes into art!

Have a look at the last event to see what sort of fun we had and then why not finish the day with a ride along the new safe Cycle Way en famille??

We'll be posting more details over the next few weeks but please spread the word to the parents and children in your lives and hop over to like our Facebook page and the WOOP! page to keep up to date with all the details as they unfold.

Cycle Chic Kids Are Go!

Calling all Cycle Chic Kids - Bling Your Bike at the Newtown Festival!

Ok so there are a lot of bikes in Newtown, that's a fact. So at next Sunday's Festival, we expect to see some serious cycle chic.
The Festival is one of Sydney's largest and longest running free community festivals and will be a day full of the usual community shenanigans. World music, great food, an Eco Zone, the wonderful Great Aussie Clothes Swap, stalls, bicycle valet parking with free tune-ups, kids activities and.....no wait, kids activities?

Now there is something pretty cool happening for our little bicycle warriors at the Newtown Festival this year. Something that I have a very keen interest in, being mother to a mini bicycle maniac.
Kids are not only being encouraged to ride to the festival, brilliant in itself, but they are also being invited to decorate their bikes for the inaugural "Bling Your Bike" competition.

Open to kids of Primary School age, all they have to do is go bananas with the recycling and get crafty with their bikes, ride up to the festival and register and then join the parade through the park. The City of Sydney's Bicycle Ambassadors will judge the best bikes, there will be cool prizes and proud parents.

Kids love bikes, especially Cycle Chic Kids (as Mikael's son Felix from Copenhagen Cycle Chic proves) and they should be riding and having fun.  We were all kids once and we remember what it was like. So if you have small people, help them funk up their bike, pimp yours while you're at it and head on down to the festival next Sunday.  We'll be there with bells on.


The festival is on November 14 from 9.30-5.30 at Camperdown Memorial Rest Park, Australia Street, Newtown.
Festival details here and full kids competition details here.

Ride To Work Sydney 2010

Wonderful to see so many people take their bikes to the streets today for Ride To Work Day but it's still puzzling to me why they feel the need to wear "cycling gear".  I haven't been faced with so much lycra since my clubbing days in the '80's.

But I went in search of, and found, just a little chic in amongst the fluoro spandex......

    

     

[Jamie & Jacqui from I ♥ Sydney Bike Lanes and Cycle Ways]

[Show Sydney you care - wear Alan in Spring. T-shirts available from Remy & Lees on Bourke St]

[City of Sydney Cycling Ambassador Nell Schofield with Susan modelling a Rocket Fuel cycling cap]

Bicycle Sculptures Around the World

When you first see the Bike Bike sculpture in Martin Place, it takes your breath away.  It's huge.
Constructed from old bicycles in the shape of a Penny Farthing, this 12 metre high bicycle by Alasdair Nicol is part of the City of Sydney's 2010 Art and About Festival.
Thought provoking and absolutely timely as Sydney continues to "green" the city and encourage us to think about sustainable modes of transport.  Oh and it's a beautiful work of art too.
It's at the Macquarie Street end of Martin Place until October 24.

Another wonderful bicycle sculpture was unveiled in August this year in Gdansk, Poland. during the 30th anniversary celebrations of the Solidarity movement.  Honouring the Gdansk shipyard workers, whose most common mode of transport was the bicycle.

UPDATED!!

This is so utterly fabulous I had to add it... thanks Nevenka for the link and Sydney Daily Photo for posting.

The Watershed Bike Library Launched!

This really is a wonderful idea and if it is to survive the 12 month trial period, it needs, and deserves our support.

A joint initiative between City of Sydney and Marrickville Councils, and in partnership with Bike Sydney, Australia's first 'bike library' consists of a small fleet of cargo bikes and specialist trailers that can be borrowed for up to three days.  Membership and hire fees are very affordable which makes this a perfect option for anyone needing to transport large items or small children [!] or indeed anything that your imagination can dream up.

Launched on Friday by Lord Mayor Clover Moore MP and Mayor of Marrickville, Sam Iskandar, there were jokes about them being able to fit a fridge.  But jokes aside, the Lord Mayor said "we are offering an affordable, convenient, healthy and environmentally friendly alternative to running errands in cars.  This unique library will encourage more people to use bikes to get around their local area".
Citing Alan Jones's anti-cycle ways campaign as hostile, her speech was well received by the group of Sydney's cycling advocates, local community representatives and bike business owners present.

With the Watershed's commitment to sustainable urban living, and Sydney's current push towards getting more cars OFF the roads and more bikes ON them, this has a definite 'right time, right place' feel about it.
Cargo bikes are used widely in Europe but they have yet to become commonplace in Australia, so what are you waiting for ?  Be the first to go and try one out, take your girlfriend/boyfriend/mother, move some stuff, do some shopping or just take the kids out for a spin - trust me they will love it!

Fee Schedule and further details on the Watershed's website here.