Glowing in the dark – bright lights for bikes on dark nights

05Nov11

So in case you are not in Scotland right now, you should know that winter is starting to take hold. It always seems to creep up on me and quickly slap me in the face, with it’s startlingly dark nights that start all of a sudden at 4.00pm in the afternoon. AFTERNOON. And then, gone are the lovely long nights, where I can cycle home pleasantly along the quiet back country roads. So quiet in fact, that unfortunately, on my own – in the dark – these quiet back roads are not really so alluring.

Anyway, thinking about being safe on the bike, in the dark, got me thinking about lights and all things bright. And after a little bit of Twitter talk, it seems we may have inadvertedly come up with a potential fun creative project to work on for a day or two when I can find the time. REFLECTIVES.

Reflectives really are quite clever. no new realisation there. but what better way to make yourself seen than shine other people’s lights back at them. Of course some other lights are necessary to be able to see, but to be seen – a little bit of clever reflective work could save lighting yourself up like a christmas tree & having to carry all the batteries… as you could still look tree tastic, but only when someone shines a light on you.

Now these guys ‘We Flashy’ over on Kickstarter  are the inspiration with their fun reflective clothing range that they would like to launch. They have a great idea and have made some simple, but stylish reflective clothing. Which can seamlessly transform everyday clothes into cycle safe reflective wear.

I have also seen the Stella McCartney glow in the dark designs for Addidas, the top glowing tweed by Russel Howarth for the more sophisticated amongst us, the retr0-reflective tie for the smarter cycling commuter and the reflective bike wheel rim tape – so there are a few people thinking about this issue. And of course there are hundreds of neon vest options.

But I think this blog post by ‘Breaking Chains and Taking Lanes’ about their exploration of retro reflectives is also a pretty good read and also sums up some of the things I have been thinking about.

So yes, a wee winter challenge to simply create something a little more personally pleasing and homegrown in the reflective clothing front. So yes, keep an eye out and I may share the results a little later.

Top image is via Gwen’s River City Images on Flickr

Filed under: Bikes, Design, fashion   |  4 Comments
Tags: 2011, Bikes, clothing, Cycling, dark nights, Design, fahradd, fashion, fiets, glow in the dark, neon, reflectives, retro-reflectives, scotland, style, velo