Vanilla Bicycles

interview by Kevin Sparrow
photographs by Peter DiAntoni

If looks could kill a vanilla bicycle would be an ultra-lethal vigilante.
Sacha White has taken custom frame building to a different level. Each Vanilla is treated like an art project that could be hung in a gallery. To most city cyclists this may be hard to swallow considering most bikes are abused down to rusted metal. I’ve heard quotes like “why buy a bike that you are afraid to ride?” And “I would feel guilty riding that.” But any first scratch on a new bike is heartbreaking. None the less it’s what is underneath the paint that counts. The Cycle Messenger World Championships in Seattle was the first time I saw a Vanilla. The owner was Seng Chen, it was a white fixed gear with a derailleur hanger. I saw pictures of it recently on flickr and it was more beautiful than I remembered. Three years of use and abuse told a sweet story of the relationship between rider and bike. To me nothing is better than owning a bike you love.

COG Magazine caught up with Sacha White at the Vanilla workshop to see what goes on beneath the paint.

How did you start building frames, where did your passion come from?

In ’97 I moved to Portland from Boulder. I found a job as a bike messenger and did that for a little over four years. While working as a messenger, I was also doing all of my own mechanical work on my bikes. This evolved from tuning my bikes and building wheels to deeper customization.
After rebuilding my own bikes several times and building up some bikes for friends, I was left wanting more (creatively).

Around that same time, the Bianchi that I was racing and messengering on broke. I got the name of a man who could fix it from my local bike shop and took it to him. When I walked into his shop, I saw all of these raw frames, the man was brazing one right in front of me. It struck me as magic. Alchemy, really. This was the next step I was looking for.

The man turned out to be master builder Tim Paterek (author of The Paterek Manual for Framebuilders).
I got to talking with Tim and found out that he occasionally took on framebuilding students. The more I asked around, the more this seemed like a great avenue to learn. After a year of saving, I was able to study under Tim. This is where I built my first frame.

For the following year and a half, I rented equipment from another person who was just starting out and I dedicated all of my spare time to building. I built 15 bikes during that time, most of them cross racing bikes and a couple of work bikes for fellow couriers.

The beauty of building bicycle frames with traditional methods is that you don’t need fancy machines. People were building bikes at the turn of the last century with very modest tools; files, a hack saw, a torch, a vise and a good method to hold tubes while brazing. That is all that a new builder needs today.

I started slow and let Vanilla grow at a sustainable pace. It was important to me that I start without the pressure of debt. I didn’t want to get myself into a situation where I was forced to produce just so that I could pay the bills each month. The first couple of years were all about experimenting and learning. I didn’t want my creative process to be suffocated by real world concerns.

I think a lot about how I want to live, what I want my business to accomplish and what kind of builder I want to be. Typically in this global economy the goal is to grow as big as possible as fast as possible, even if it is at the cost of quality and integrity. I have intentionally shirked that measure of success to focus on growing as a craftsman and growing a business that can take care of it’s employees and it’s community.

What is the Speedvagen?

Speedvagen is a race bike project coming out of the Vanilla Workshop. The plan is to bring in great builders from around the world two times a year to help fabricate a small run of Road Race Machines and Cross Race machines. My main role is as the designer, with a very limited supporting role with the fabrication.
My focus with these bikes was to strip everything that is not essential for racing and refine what is left. The form itself is clean and understated and it has technical elements that can’t be found on other bikes, like it’s integrated braking system, custom drawn SL tubing and the newest generation Vanilla drops. These design elements helped to make this year’s team bikes a half-pound lighter than last year’s team bikes.
This project opens the door for racers to access the innovation and performance coming out of the Vanilla Workshop without having to wait for years and years.

What are your favorite tools?

6” half round bastard file and my 15 centimeter ruler
The “bastard” is the most aggressive of all files, and half round means it is round on one side and flat on the other. The 6” HRB is not too cumbersome and a good all arounder. It is good for finish work, like thinning lugs, and filing fillets.

I use the 15cm ruler all the time. The 15 cm ruler is a simple precision tool with 1mm marks and 1/2mm marks. I use it to measure the depth of slots in chainstays, seatstays and fork blades, when I am prepping them for dropouts to be brazed in. I also use it when I am measuring for front and rear wheel alignment. I use it during my fitting process. I have one in particular that lives on my magnetic tool bar and when it’s missing I’m generally pretty worthless.

What are some important things rookie frame builders should know?

1- It is hard work, but that’s what makes it good. It’s honest.
2- Starting out on your own is fine, but if someone comes to you for a custom bike, they should understand your level of experience. There is no reason that they need to believe that you have it dialed, when you are still learning. Learning is cool, and an early customer should be stoked to be a part of that process.
3- When brazing, make sure the metal is super clean and spend time preheating the joint well, before trying to add filler. The cleaner everything is and the more thorough the preheat, the smoother everything will go.

What is your opinion on the whole fixed gear movement?

I don’t know, man. Sometimes I see people on a brakeless fixie start going from a stop light and three blocks later they are still trying to get into their toe clips. Should that person really be riding a bike without brakes?
I like the sensation of riding fixed, though. And as a form, I think there is no bike more beautiful than a track bike, or a single speed cross bike.
Also, someone with mad fixed skills is pretty great to behold. I definitely respect that.

What is your daily rider?

I have an Xtracycle equipped city bike to tote my younger daughter around on and to get groceries.
I ride the first bike I built, too. It is a full fendered, lugged, single speed cross bike.
I have a fire engine red townie that my friend Ira Ryan built for me.
My main squeeze though, is my Speedvagen cross race machine.

**Do you race your bicycles? **

I do race, some years more than others. I have raced cross most every year since I started in ‘98, and I expect my focus will continue to be cross. That goes for the Vanilla race team as well. Cyclocross is the most challenging and the most gratifying. I love that the scene here in Oregon is so warm and genuine.

Boxers, tighty whiteys, or commando?

Boxer briefs, usually. Leopard spotted hot shorts on very special occasions.

Any strange customer requests?

Animal shapes, or paw prints come up from time to time. I usually have to be bribed to do that kind of thing. No one has asked me to build a stash chamber in a travel bike yet. That seems weird to me.

**How did you come up with the name Vanilla? **

I grew up snowboarding and skateboarding. So many companies in that world had names that didn’t pertain to the product, but were more based on the feel and flavor of the word.
I was having breakfast with my friend Tony and we were talking about names that would fit this new school style of branding, and he said “like Vanilla”. I laughed it off, but the more I thought about it, the word represented the feel and sensuality that I wanted my bikes to have. It stuck.
It’s funny to think back to all of the whack names that were put on the table back then…

What are some of the mistakes you’ve made over the years?

Learning something like framebuilding is all about making mistakes. Most of my mistakes have been impactful enough I haven’t had to repeat them. Kind of perfectly painful. Some that come to mind:
I have brazed a bottom bracket in backwards, so the cartridge had to be threaded in the opposite direction of normal.
Once I did all of the finish work on a fillet brazed race bike (8 plus hours of filing and sanding) and then did the alignment check on it. It needed to be corrected, and I folded the down tube in the process. I always checked alignment before the finish work after that.
I shipped a fork (painted and all) without a brake hole drilled in it.
I guess that almost any mistake that could be made, I have made. Luckily, I have more of a sense of humor about that kind of thing now.

Do you have work dreams?

I must, but I can’t remember them right now.

What’s the most frustrating thing about being a builder?

I have a lot of projects that I want to see happen. The pace of real life can be frustrating sometimes.

Pretty paint or fancy lugs?

Neither right now.

Who or what is your biggest inspiration?

There are a handful of builders’ work that I see as “perfect” like J.P Weigle, Mark Dinucci, Toei (in Japan), Pegoretti. The picture in my mind of their work is a big motivator to keep pushing the limits and to stay honest.
I get pretty fired up when the odds are against me. If I feel like the forces in the world are trying to keep me from accomplishing my goal, I take it as a challenge and ask myself, “Are you going to be beat by this?” This has proven to be a good tool to help me persevere.
I am inspired by the idea of impressing my kids. When they are proud of me, and I feel I am providing a good example for them, it really means a lot.