Peter Naiman came East and I went West and we met at Doug Fattic's workshop
this morning. We got a great guided tour, more than a little education,
and took Doug out to breakfast.
He sure wins the award for the most interesting shop building. It looks
like a Hollywood '30s hacienda out behind his house (Lots of room for it,
the house sets on 7 lovely acres). It was crammed packed with heavy duty
tools and bikes of all kinds and ages. I was pleasantly surprised to see
that most of Doug's bikes were not the over the top lugs that I had seen in
pictures, in fact most brought to mind the wonderfully thinned lugs I had
always associated with Chris Kvale, and that the paint on most was more
conservative than I had expected ( ya, I know I'm a stick in the mud about
paint...I can't cotton up to most radical paint jobs on a bicycle). And
what paint! This guy does some seriously great paint. He showed us some
real treasures, the greatest of which was almost certainly a John Berry with
as beautiful a set of lugs as I have ever seen. Such delicacy! The bottom
bracket was the finest I have ever seen! I have pics of this bike if anyone
wants to see it...drop me a message off list. I mean, this bike made us
want to get up and dance!
There was a very tall 65cm black chrome and metallic grey Fattic bike with
wonderfully thinned out lugs there that I am trying to set a buddy up with,
too. I guess the black chrome was about $1000 extra when new. Life in the
fast lane. Peter and I got to handle everything and make appreciative
noises all morning!
We looked over his famous Ukraine Model bike and came to the conclusion that
America needs a City Bike like this. I have a pic of that, too if anyone is
interested. It was no where near as heavy as one might guess looking at
with it's smooth Chain protector and oversize hubs. I'm going to price one
soon.
Doug was a really friendly and low key host who was most generous with his
considerable knowledge and a good time was had by all. The man is charming.
Tom Sanders
Lansing, Mi