Paris Cycle Chic in Copenhagen

These two Parisiennes, Virna and Omar, are leaving Copenhagen tomorrow. Which is regrettable. They have been guests at Casa Cycle Chic, renting out my guest room through Airbnb.com and riding around the city for five days on my guest bicycles. It's always regrettable to see guests leave.

I've been hosting guests through Airbnb since last year and it's been fantastic. I grew up in a home where the doors were never locked and friends, family and neighbours waltzed in unannouced and made themselves at home. That's the kind of home I try to create for me and my kids and Airbnb has helped inject a splendid amount of cosmopolitanism into our humble home.

Most of the guests who visit know me through Cycle Chic or Copenhagenize.com or the company, but there are also others who end up here for whatever other reason. When I tell my kids that guests are arriving, they ask where they're from and look forward to meeting them. The kids are bilingual, so it's great for them to practice their English, too.

When Virna and Omar were leaving, The Lulu - aged 4 - announced that she missed them already. I take that as the ultimate accolade for any guest who visits. Virna and Omar enjoyed playing with Lulu and they got the biggest hugs from her when they left.


And not only that, they were kind enough to buy a present for me from the bookshop at the Danish Design Center. Perfect for my many work-related journeys with Cycle Chic and Copenhagenize. Merci! You're welcome back anytime.

This is what the internet does. Bring people together. I experience it every time I travel, meeting people who read this blog and who thank us for it. It strikes deep in the heart each and every time.

Now I have the chance to welcome guests here at home and that just doubles the joy.

London Cycle Chic and the Cycle Chic Book

I spent the day in London yesterday, for a meeting with my publisher - Thames & Hudson - about the upcoming Cycle Chic book. It was a great meeting and we're muscling our way towards publication.

The hardest part is choosing a short list of photos from the thousands and thousands in the Cycle Chic archives. I narrowed it down to 1300 photos from 26 cities. From there we have to cut it down even further but it's been great so far revisiting so many photos from the past four years - since that "Photo That Launched a Million Bicycles".

I'm so looking forward to seeing 'the best of' in a lovely, printed volume.

Maid Marian Muffins on a Bicycle

We always love positive bicycle imagery here at Cycle Chic so we were rather pleased (and became quite hungry) when Jessica sent us an email about Maid Marian Muffins - a Brooklyn-themed children's book app.

Maid Marian Muffins is a light-hearted tale of a muffin fan's journey from mere muffin admirer to Brooklyn baking sensation. It's based on Jessica's real-life adventures as Brooklyn's one and only bicycling baker.

The book features 36 pages of beautiful, hand-drawn illustrations by Ana Benaroya, along with a rich storyline, vividly and lyrically told. The primary interactive feature of the app is a powerful and artfully constructed self-record mechanism, one designed (by two teachers -- one former, one current) for children to use, enjoy, and understand all by themselves.

Yummy.

Maid Marian Muffins:
Here's the website.
Here's the link to the app in the US iTunes store.

Cycle Tracks Launch Party

Last Wednesday, 50 of us went for an evening bike ride to celebrate the launch of our Copenhagen Cycle Tracks guide book to Copenhagen, which I wrote with three friends. It was a great night out and fit perfectly with the concept of one of my other babies - The Slow Bicycle Movement. We went for a ride out to the Nordvest neighbourhood, stopping off at various locations we write about in the guide book, including a great Turkish bakery and an impromptu park on an empty lot. There was a poetry reading outside a bar and loads of rolling down cool urban streets and parks, enjoying beers from a cargo bike.

Here's Kristine, one of my co-authors, with her groovy-cool bicycle.

Here's some other friends, including Emma, at far left, whom you may recognise from this previous post.

A nice easy pace, perfect for conversing with friends.

This is Kristine and one of the other co-authors, Simon, on his cool Longjohn cargo bike.

Some Cycle Chic street art and a chic cycling couple.


The man carrying the beer is always a popular fellow. There are various ways to acquire beer whilst in motion. You can serve yourself [at left] or you can have it served for you [at right].

You can also get a beer from the cargo bike and then hand it off to your friend, before taking one yourself.

It started to rain a bit so we ducked into a underpass for some more beers and some dancing.

The music was, of course, mobile and propelled along the streets on this Sorte Jernhest cargo bike.

Riding a bike in heels is, of course, incredibly simple. Sometimes, however, it's best to take them off whilst dancing on a bridge in a park, before heading off into town to continue the festivities.

There are some more photos in this Flickr set. Thanks to everyone for a great night out!

Copenhagen Cycle Tracks Guide Book

ADDENDUM! 16 SEPTEMBER 2010:
The guide book is now available for purchase online RIGHT HERE, BABY!

A few months ago three friends and I decided that what visitors to Copenhagen needed was a decent guide book. Not one written by a tourist who passed through the city for a week and published in foreign countries, but rather one written by locals. An insider's guide to all the nooks and crannies you don't hear about in Rough Guides, Lonely Planets and brochures from the tourist information office.

We launched Copenhagen Cycle Tracks a week ago and we're well pleased. The book is a collaboration between Cycle Chic and Baisikeli Bike Rental. The latter is a development agency that sends used Danish bikes to workshops in Africa and if you're ever in Copenhagen, this is where you rent your bike. Got it?


The book is written by me, Henrik Smedegaard Mortensen, Kristine Baas and Simon Post. I did the art direction and took most of the photos. Each of us have chipped in with personal recommendations, identifiable with a colour code. Want to see which beach Mikael recommends? Look for the red boxes. Keen to see which bars Kristine fancies for a night out dancing? Look for the purple. And so on.

It is available from Baisikeli, the tourist information office and selected hotels and youth hostels. It costs 35 kroner - cheaper than a pint of beer.

In a way it's a bicycle guide to the city, but then again, not really. The bicycle is the preferred transport form so it's kind of silly to write a bicycle guide. We have a page with cycling tips, but other than that we're expecting people to use the bicycle to get around to the 121 exciting places. When in Rome, as they say.

To celebrate the launch of the book we went for a bike ride with 50 friends last night. I'll blog about it shortly.

If all goes according to plan we'll do it again next year, complete with mobile phone apps and a website.