Cool on Wheels: Prague's Best Custom Bikes

“So you want to buy a bicycle?” asks the opening chapter of The Complete Book of Bicycling (1970) by Eugene A. Sloane. The guide continues with the questions you might be wondering about at this very moment: 

Here in Prague, retro bikes have become quite the trend. Vit Hlousek, founder of Le Bikes, has turned his passion for bikes like the Eska-Favorit from 1960s Czechoslovakia into a career, by restoring and customizing them in his Žižkov studio/shop. “These bikes are better than new ones, because no factory could pay so much attention to them,” he says.

Bike frames are a particular point of pride for the Czech company Festka, which offers customized bikes that begin with steel, titanium, or carbon frames. Founded by Ondřej Novotný and Michael Moureček (himself a one-time professional cyclists) Festka operates workshops all over the country with a Prague-based shop in Vinohrady. They want to emphasize, however, that their bikes aren’t just for “Muddy, sweaty creatures in a tight sports jersey.”

Also manned by experts from the world of professional cycling is Bicycle Cafe which provides tailor-made mountuain and road bikes as well as full-service repairs.

Need some additional inspiration for pimping your ride? The bike-sharing initiative Rekola organizes regular bike-painting workshops at Radlicka 125; the new Kuráž Czech design store on Benediktska has brightly hued seats from Slovak label Retart.

The bike-loving population will not want to overlook Hyena Bike Labs, another local custom-bike service that also organizes regular rides and races and is currently developing a line of equipment and accessories. Among their topsellers are the Hyena cages, simple steel-tube racks with a vintage feel that are adjustable to fit any bike.

For those who want to take the retro bike thing to a whole new level, the English-friendly e-shop Štěrba Bike specializes in rare historical bicycles, components, cycling-related vintage posters and ads, and will also customize your bike.

If you haven’t yet committed to buying a bike, check out Green Lemon bike rentals (on Myslikova near Karlova náměstí) which hires lovely blue Manchester bikes – manufactured here in the Czech Republic – for tooling around town.

One of them, Auto-mat has been very active over the past years in the fight to create safer and more pleasant biking conditions for cyclists in the Czech capital. Most recently they have campaigned to make the stretch of the Vltava riverbank from Charles Bridge to the Rudolfinum, car-free.

This year Auto-mat continues its effort with their annual “To Work on a Bike” project which is popularizing biking as an ideal way to get to work. What’s your excuse? It’s time to honk, ring, and roll!

What do you think? Has the city of Prague become bike friendlier?

Don’t forget to check out our classifieds server for deals on classic Czech wheels.