Calfee’s unique Bamboo bicycles will now be available in the UK, as RAW Bamboo Bikes have announced they’re to handle the UK distribution.

US-based Calfee has been building carbon fibre frames sicne 1988 and has quite a reputation. Most interesting – or at least most exotic – of the frames it sells have to be the ones made from Bamboo. Considerably overlooked in favour of other more exotic materials, Bamboo is actually one of the strongest materials on the planet, with great tensile strength which makes it suitable for bicycle frames, as Calfee are keen to promote.

Craig Calfee reckons that bamboo offers a better combination of stiffness and compliance than carbon fibre. And sales of his bamboo bicycles have been growing in the last few years.

The Bamboo Bike is hand-made from bamboo smoked and heat treated to prevent splitting with hemp fibre lugs. Chainstays are made from carbon fibre for extra stiffness while a satin polyurethane coating is applied to seal the bamboo.

Frames are available with various geometry options suitable for racing, triathlon and cyclo-cross. Prices start from £2175 for a frame or £3000 for a complete build.

Could Bamboo bikes be the future? It certainly has all the right green credentials, being fast growing, able to absorb more Co2 than trees and requiring less resource to grow. Did you know Bamboo grows at a rate of a metre a day?

More at www.calfeedesign.com and www.rawbamboobikes.co.uk.