Doug F raised some interesting points and also dropped the following
bomb:
> I own what I believe is the finest frame ever made [snip], I'm
> saying the best frame anyone ever made.
Wow, now you've got my attention. I am positively slavering for a photo essay on that frame! Please o please?
> People will spend a half million or more on a car, why not
> $10,000 on a bicycle frame?
I made a few >$10,000 (off-topic non-ferrous) frames, but that was the gay 90s - will we ever see times like that again? ;)
It did seem like, for a certain type of customer, the more expensive we made it, the more they liked it. I suspect we never found the bottom of that well; probably our own reluctance to do anything more outrageous than that prevented those certain customers from realizing they "needed" that level of outrageousness. A failure of imagination on my part, and maybe slightly, an unwillingness to go there.
I guess the fact that I just chose the word outrageous to describe "extra" frame workmanship, features, artistic expression, engineering, whatever, indicates that I have a bit of the Puritan in me, and I am not completely comfortable with making toys for the rich while so many others starve. Yes, I know the "regular" $2500 frames I made were just that, and I really don't believe such things shouldn't be purchased. I'm not being logical here, just emoting.
I'm actually really glad Glenn Erickson made the frame where the two headlugs were a dragon that wrapped around the head tube, its head forming the toptube lug point and its tail forming the downtube lug point. Not a flat outline either; it had scales, eyes and other details carved in bas-relief (I think - working from years-old memory here). The seatlug was a knight with a sword. Sure wish I had pictures of that frame - in memory, it is the "best" bike frame I have ever seen.
Mark Bulgier
Seattle WA USA