In an ongoing wave of warm and ideal cycling weather, so-called cycle cafés are taking London by storm and acting as a catalyst for similarly-inspired developments.

Whilst pedestrians tend to frequent the same old cafés, the increased mobility afforded by the growing abundance of bicycles in the capital is enabling new business opportunities and new discoveries for cyclists.

Look Mum No Hands! is said to be the trendiest new cycle café on Old Street, equipped with bike-lock-friendly plant pots and showing live cycle racing on screen for visitors to enjoy whilst refuelling and having their bikes fixed. The bike-oriented café has a workshop to the rear of the facility, a fully licensed bar and every imaginable type of security fixture. Also within the near vicinity, premium cycle clothing brand Rapha has recently unveiled its pop-up outlet on Clerkenwell Road.

Until recently, London would have apparently been unable to support such a growth in cycle cafés, however far more people are now cycling in the Capital.

On the strength of the precedent set by London’s range of cycle cafés thus far, a juice bar and bike workshop called CycleLab has now opened up on Pitfield Street. In its real infancy after just a few weeks in operation, the juice bar also sells bikes as well as servicing them to add another point of differentiation.

Meanwhile Broadway Market’s Lock 7, one of the city’s first such cafés, hopes to maintain its share of the market amidst the flurry of new competition, with Japanese Tokyobike set to open permanent sites by the end of the year.

Posted by Hayley on the 26th July 2010