Kraftwerk have always been into bikes, right since the group’s Tour de France was released, back in 1983. Now another Kraftwerk bike has come up for auction.
There’s no record of Kraftwerk co-founder Ralf Hütter having actually ridden the bike in the current lot. But the Canyon Ultimate CF SLX Kraftwerk is one of a limited edition of just 21 with graphics designed by Hütter as part of a collaboration ahead of the 2017 Tour de France Grand Départ in Düsseldorf, Kraftwerk’s home city.
At the time, Roman Arnold, Canyon's founder, said he had been moved to work with Hütter by “memories of partying in friends’ basements as a teenager [listening to] Kraftwerk’s groundbreaking sounds.”
One of 21
The Canyon Ultimate CF SLX Kraftwerk was originally sold by Canyon for €10,000, so it will be interesting to see if its value has increased in the intervening nine years. The bike at auction, numbered 5 of 21, has a pre-sale estimate of £10,000 to £20,000, so there's a good chance it has.
It is decked out in SRAM and Zipp’s finest, with Hütter’s intricate geometric pattern of reflective tape on the matt black frame claimed by Canyon to have taken over seven hours of work per frame.
The bike is accompanied in the lot at auction by a Kraftwerk cycling jersey, tee shirt, water bottle and other bits and pieces, including its numbered certificate and original packaging.
A year ago, the titanium Speedwell bike ridden by the late Florian Schneider in the band’s 1984 Tour de France video sold at auction for $57,600, plus 28% buyer’s premium, so there's clearly an active market for Kraftwerk-related cycling memorabilia.
If you want a piece of the Kraftwerk action, Propstore’s auction takes place on 1 and 2 October, with a pre-sale exhibition at the Cumberland Hotel in London from 24 to 27 September.
