Singular Cycles make bikes out of metal, produced in small runs and designed for off-road riding. This year at Bespoked Dresden, Brooks will be exhibiting one of Singular’s Kite Ti Mk2 models, fitted – of course – in a selection of our finest products.

Singular is run from the UK by Sam Alison, with a small US base at the headquarters of Chris King in Portland. 

Earlier this year, Brooks invited Singular to be a part of the Open Factory event held in Smethwick, alongside a host of other significant British bicycle-makers. It was a chance to look back as well as forward, to deepen relationships with companies like Singular, and to discuss our shared futures. 

When Brooks was planning for Bespoked Dresden, having Singular along for the ride just seemed to make sense.

Under Alison’s leadership, the company has been producing bikes since 2006. Impressive longevity for an independent builder. The ethos is simple, and perhaps that’s part of why the brand has been able to persist for two decades in a tumultuous period for the industry.

“I try and focus on three key things in the design process,” he says. “First and foremost, ride quality and geometry – ensuring that the bike rides nicely for its intended purpose. Then it’s about performance, so does it actually do its job well? Finally, from a practical perspective, the bike is easy to work on: we use common standards, avoid internal cable routing, and make it user-serviceable for a long life.”

The Kite is as close to a flagship as Singular has, and it’s fair to say that the model name has been around the block. This, after all, is the titanium Mk2 – and there’s also a long lineage of Kites built with steel.

So what actually defines a Kite?

“I’d say they’re a ‘fast gravel bike’. Very nice riding, reasonably lightweight, fairly typical geometry. There’s nothing too crazy going on. They’re not long. They’re not super slack. They’re not exceptionally off-road leaning in terms of orientation.

“But then they’re also super versatile as well. You could build it up with slick tires and mudguards for a really nice fast winter road bike, or throw on some fat tyres and bags and racks and things for some more kind of adventure touring.

“I try to make careful choices in the design in terms of the tube selection, geometry, rack mount placements and so forth, to make them practical and usable for a wide range of things.”

Alison says he didn’t always think of the Kite in these terms.

“Initially, I saw it as a ‘cross bike with extra large tyre clearances so they could run up to 45mm tyres. It was a rim-braked, steel, quite traditional ‘cross bike. Beautiful, very slender steel fork that rode very nicely. Quite lightweight steel frames; the rim brakes allowed you to run some lighter tubing in key areas.”

Two major factors moved things on. The arrival of gravel and the growing viability of hydraulic disc brakes. The second steel Kite had discs, and benefitted from a market that was gravel-curious. The titanium production runs only started recently.

“We’d always done some custom titanium. People used them as ‘cross-slash-gravel frames. We launched our first production run of titanium frames last year (the Mk1) and the Mk2 is the one you see on show at Bespoked.”

In terms of frame geometry, not much has changed between the two titanium versions of the Kite. However, there are some big differences in the detail.

“The big change is the titanium fork with the 3D-printed crown and dropouts. It also has some nice 3D-printed rear dropouts. The 3D printing process gives you flexibility, letting you use shapes and forms you wouldn’t otherwise be able to create.

“What [3D printing] allows us to do with the fork is have a lot of clearance under the crown and around the tyre for both large tyres and mudguards, without altering the geometry too much and making too long a fork and therefore too high a front end.”

Alison adds that this way of constructing the fork is “significantly lighter”.

For a show bike, there has to be some razzle dazzle. As such, this version of the Kite Mk2 sees the titanium frame get a green anodised finish, which is then echoed in the choice of Chris King headset and other small detail parts.

The bike features our Cambium Rubber Bar Tape, and a Swallow Leather Saddle.