Bicycle Shop Adeline Adeline
We live in an age of borrowed nostalgia. Nineteenth-century mustaches on every upper lip and pre-Prohibition cocktails on every bar menu. We listen to music from the ’70s and wear clothes from the ’80s. And now, thanks to Tribeca shop Adeline Adeline, we can ride bicycles from ’40s. The shop, which opened on Reade Street last month, offers a variety of De Sica-era rides for the old at heart, ranging from the no-frills Roadster Classic from Linus to the Princess Sovereign from Pashley, which comes complete with skirt guard and wicker basket. Julie Hirschfeld opened Adeline Adeline, named after both of her grandmothers, to fill what she saw as a gap in the New York-market for the rider who is neither the scruffy fixed-gear enthusiast nor the bodysuited weekend racer. New York is a city of tribes, and its cyclists are no different.
Adeline Adeline presents the bicycle as fetishized object, like a Maybach or a Giacometti, each placed on the smooth platform that spans the length of the store, in contrast to the crammed racks that pack most cycling shops. The accessories—a variety of baskets, saddles, bells, headlights, helmets, and panniers—hang from the opposite wall, each perfectly designed item glistening under a spotlight. The bicycles, mostly from Europe—the Abicis in azzuro, crema, and rosso from Italy, the baby/dog/grocery-ready Bakfiets from Holland—are uniformly gorgeous, with clean lines in cheerful colors. The staff will let you take any model out for a spin; there’s nothing like a weekend ride along the neighborhood’s impossibly charming cobblestone streets to seal the deal. These are bicycles for the girls who prefer Lanvin to Lycra, those men you see cycling down Grand Street in a full suit even in August. These are rides your parents would have had: vintage, classic, but completely modern.
Adeline Adeline, 147 Reade Street, 212-227-1150, http://www.adelineadeline.com
Photography Julian Schratter
