ECO-FRIENDLY: A Bambu Campos bike on display at Katara Art Centre. Photo by Anand Holla
By Anand Holla
Slowly and steadily, Spanish company Bambu Campos Bikes has been winning the hearts and legs of avid cyclists across the world. It was only a matter of time before this new eco-friendly line of bicycles wowed Qatar as well.
Inside Katara’s Building Number 5, a winsome fixed-gear Bambu Campos bicycle is parked in style, and the whole chic range of bamboo and carbon fibre bikes, such as fixed, single speed and urban, is now finally available upon order for the residents of Qatar. While you get to ride a smooth-moving, stylish bicycle that stands out among the crowd, the driving purpose behind this brand is sustainability and a genuine concern for the environment.
The totally customisable collection of Bambu Campos Bikes allows you to choose your preferred way of riding and thereby have the specifications incorporated in the design process.
You can, for instance, choose the number of speeds and the percentage content of carbon and bamboo in construction or even the size of the bike frame. You can take your pick from different colours, sizes, geometries and components to ensure that your finished product is completely original and brings out your personality while you ride.
Run by a father-son duo who operate from their store in Zaragoza in Northern Spain, Bambu Campos bicycles use Asian raw materials that are more sustainable than aluminium and steel. Despite its lightness, bamboo offers more tensile strength than steel (28,000 newtons per square inch, compared to steel’s 23,000) and dampens shocks and vibrations better as well. Unlike steel, aluminium or titanium, bamboo frames leave nearly no carbon footprint during manufacturing.
According to Bambu Campos, the assorted bamboo sticks are treated with heat and resins to multiply their strength and durability. Then, they are fused together using carbon fibre, which is as light as aluminium. Each bamboo stick that the team uses is specially picked and crafted for use, and takes more than 40 hours of hard, hand-made graft to transform it into the bike of someone’s dreams.
“Bamboo Bikes Campos is a concept of sustainable development of high-performance bicycles made from selected 100 per cent natural bamboo. We call the work we do, useful crafts. We analyse in detail every customisation that we make for our customers. Each bamboo used for the creation of our bikes is selected and carved to achieve the perfect fit,” their website says. Also, with the use of carbon fibre and bamboo, the bike weight is greatly reduced.
The Bambu Campos also holds informative workshops and also have a one-on-one bespoke service where clients can come in and talk about their bike aspirations to ensure they get exactly what they’re looking for.
About 121 years ago, the world got its first bamboo bike. It was introduced by the Bamboo Cycle Company in London in 1894 and it drew a lot of praise. The bamboo cycle trend then disappeared into obscurity and making an inspired comeback in the last few years.
