Three Northern Californian companies came together to collaborate on this putty-coloured ‘crosser: San Francisco’s Ornot clothing brand, Santa Barbara’s Stinner Frameworks and the Bay Area’s Ritchey Components.
Aaron Stinner’s Frameworks don’t do things by halves: their frames are highly regarded the world over, and with good reason. A Stinner frame is well-crafted, but their in-house painter, James Bellerue, has also been a major contributor to their success.
The coats of paint that James applies to Stinner frames are striking and individual, a natural choice for a collaboration with Ornot, who place a huge emphasis on strong graphic design for their apparel.
Ornot was founded in 2013 from a frustration with the current trend of kit emblazoned with corporate logos, and have thus established themselves as a brand of US designed-and-made that doesn’t need to brand itself.
For this project, Ornot and Stinner teamed up with another NorCal native, Ritchey Components, to produce a team bike for local CX racing, painted by James to reflect Ornot’s latest graphic identity, and it features newly-released developments by Ritchey.
The front end of the collaborative bike is spearheaded by the new tapered Ritchey disc fork, as well as their new headset. The fork is a 1-1/8″ to 1-1/4″ full carbon fork with post mounts for disc and an innovative through axle design.
The headset comprises an oversized external lower race for 44mm headtubes, created to match perfectly with the new fork. 40C tires fit with room to spare, both between the fork legs and the chain and seat stays.
Identically corresponding colors to the Ornot team’s CX skinsuits were carried on to the seat tube and WCS C260 stem. The result is a culmination of the best of all three businesses — and it’s sure to be a ride-away success at this season’s events.
Ornot Website | Facebook | Instagram
Stinner Website | Facebook | Instagram
Ritchey Website | Facebook | Instagram