The Bicycle Illustrations of Daniel Rebour
 
Daniel Rebour illustrated all the cool and best bikes and components of the expanded Golden Age of fine, artsy, functional, beautiful bicycles. He drew whole bikes, and all the components. He often drew the insides of things, and his drawings are perfectly proportioned, accurate in all details, and exceedingly pleasant to gaze at individually, by the page, or by the whole damn book.
After a long session of amazement-style gazing at this book, you achieve a kind of mellowness, sick nostalgia, and inner anger at the state of bicycle aesthetics today. Where have the artists gone, who let the dogs out and trained them in CAD? And all that. But it’s a kind of history lesson in bikes—not as obvious as The Data Book, but no crummier. One doesn’t beat the other. There’s some overlap, but they’re complimentary. If you like bikes, like art, and have the money and table-top or shelf space, you’ll like owning both.
This book was made possible through the combined efforts and cooperation of Fred DeLong, one of the American cycling fanatics and engineers in the 1970s, who had a collection of source material that he ended up giving or lending to Frank Berto, a Fairfax-based cycling engineer also. And Jan Heine, who had some material they didn’t have, and had a kind of French connection;  and David Herlihy, bicycle historian and author, who had his own collection of Rebour illustrations; and Rebour’s living niece, Martine—Rebour’s only living heir, who gave it all her OK.