CUSTOM PAINTED

CUSTOM MADE

What I owe to Barry for Sculpture, and to John and Judy for Woodworking, I owe to Toby Stanton for Bike Frame Building and Frame Painting. Toby is simply unparalleled in the business. No one else could teach me to fit, design, weld, paint, and build a complete bike like Toby; and he did so while running a world class U19 Bike Team called Hot Tubes. His is one of the most diverse skillsets I’ve ever had the pleasure to work alongside. 

 

I worked at the Hot Tubes shop for years — until Covid hit — merging my art background with my years of experience racing bikes as an Ironman Triathlete. Frame building demands absolute precision, and yet ironically, Toby’s particular brand of genius — which involves holistic and analytical thought — taught me less how to comply, and more how to improvise. It’s one thing to know that something works; it’s another to know why it works. TIG welding and spraying urethane paints are especially unforgiving practices. Mistakes and problems are inevitable. Toby embedded a lesson in me which has far reaching implications both in and out of the shop: There is always a solution.