Quiet luxury that brings beauty and simplicity to every journey - it is our pleasure to partner with Paul & Michelle of design house Considered Things, with the support of Pashley owner and Townhouse Bicycle Ambassador, Sir Charles Saumarez Smith.
Here we bring you the story behind The Townhouse Bicycle.
Paul’s Story
“Bicycles have been as central to my life as art, design, and architecture – racing, riding, and building them since childhood. The two-wheeled companion actually inspired me to design things: to observe, draw, build, and care for them. To me, they're beautiful pieces of design – like furniture, but with the added benefit of seeing the world.
“But something was missing. When wanting to invest in a beautiful bicycle, the market typically steers you towards 'heads-down' performance. There's little that celebrates slow travel or embodies quiet luxury. The Townhouse Bicycle changes that – its upright riding position invites a different experience of the city, paired with the joy of everyday ownership.
“For many of us, bicycles are as much objects in the home as tools for movement. They should exist as beautiful furniture does – considered, enduring, and worthy of the space they occupy.
“Simplicity is essential: a bicycle to enjoy owning. Nothing complicated, easy to care for. Designed to age gracefully, acquiring character rather than obsolescence. Minimal branding and detailing reduce visual noise, while a colour and material palette was curated to make a beautiful companion. And, crucially, upholding everyday utility – a versatile vehicle for daily journeys, errands, and adventures.
“As a fellow Pashley owner and life-long advocate, working with this remarkable company in its 100th year couldn't be more perfect. The Townhouse Bicycle is simply the bicycle I wanted to own and live with – a piece of quiet luxury that brings beauty and simplicity to every journey, and to life at home.”
Paul West of Considered Things; a design house rethinking how we live and what we live with.
Charles’ Story
“I have known about Pashley bicycles for a long time, ever since I bought a Pashley Princess for my wife as a present in the mid-1980s. At the time, I was involved in establishing the postgraduate History of Design course run jointly by the V&A and the Royal College of Art. Both teachers and students were deeply preoccupied by issues surrounding the sociology of taste, inspired by the writings of cultural theorists like Daniel Miller and Pierre Bourdieu. Stephen Bayley had just opened the Boilerhouse Project in the basement of the V&A and the first issue of Blueprint magazine, edited by Deyan Sudjic, appeared in October 1983.
“Alongside the sociological writing on taste, there were guidebooks to the jungle of social tribes, beginning with The Official Sloane Ranger’s Handbook: The First Guide to What Really Matters in Life. The Pashley Princess was the pin-up image of a group of architectural historians described by Alexandra Artley and John Martin Robinson as the National Trust Navy in The New Georgian Handbook, published by Ebury Press in 1985. It was a symbol of a solidly built, British product, a cult object. In fact, the young Dan Cruickshank, then an architectural journalist, later a TV commentator, appeared on its cover outside his house in Spitalfields with his Pashley Roadster.
“At the time, I rode a traditional straightforward bicycle without gears (I could not afford a Roadster) which I had bought relatively inexpensively from a bicycle shop called Edwardes, established in 1908 in a row of shops on the Camberwell Road, near where we used to live in Trinity Church Square. There were many fewer bicycle shops in those days, no cult of bicycling, and the Department of Education and Science paid for my season ticket to travel daily to the Warburg Institute in Woburn Square. I never realized that it would have been much quicker to bicycle and possibly even to walk.
“About twenty five years ago I was bicycling back from central London (there must have been a bicycle strike as I didn’t ordinarily cycle into work). As I was waiting for the traffic lights next door to The Blind Beggar, a Guv’nor drew up alongside me. I had never see one before. I went home and ordered one straight off. But when it arrived, I thought it was so smart and so highly desirable that if I were ever to ride it, it would certainly be stolen. So, it sat, an object of deep veneration, in the basement, waiting for my retirement.
“My views changed during COVID. I had the delusion that one was less likely to catch COVID on a bicycle than walking and so took to going on daily bicycle rides round east London on my Guv’nor, speeding through the parks and off to buy essential supplies of fruit and cheese at Spa Terminus. I began to enjoy its pleasures, travelling along the towpath south of Victoria Park, across the motorway into Hackney Park, to the green spaces of Olympic Park and then south down the River Lea and back home by way of the Limehouse Cut. Or, as an alternative, I could bicycle northwards past the great wooden Velodrome at the north end of Olympic Park, across playing fields and along a branch of the River Lea towards the Walthamstow Wetlands. My Guv’nor enabled me to discover a whole new urban topography up to Tottenham Hale.
“I now use my Guv’nor as a way of taking daily exercise — so much cheaper and more interesting than doing weight lifting in the local gym. I have acquired a bright red Dashel cycling helmet and go to buy bread and cheese at one or other of the excellent East London artisan shops, most often to E5 under the railway arches on Mentmore Terrace in Hackney. It is just the right distance away along a short stretch of the Regent’s Canal and then back across London Fields. But I also often go to Leila’s Store in Calvert Avenue which has excellent cheese from Neal’s Yard and fruit she chooses herself.
“I’m now looking forward to the launch of the latest model, The Townhouse, which feels as if it has been designed for me only: not quite as low-slung, so that, once more, I can sit up and enjoy the view as I tour round the streets of East London; five gears, so that I don’t have to puff up the hill; painted in a suitably tasteful colour, known as ‘down to earth’. I am looking forward to taking it out on its first spin.”
Charles Saumarez Smith has been Director of the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery and, from 2007 to 2018, was Secretary and Chief Executive of the Royal Academy of Arts. He now writes a blog, has recently published John Vanbrugh: The Drama of Architecture, and is architectural correspondent for The Critic.
Michelle’s Story
A love letter to Pashley - the elegant chaperone of our relationship
“Ours is a friendship turned relationship that developed over many miles. We’d walk and talk to decompress after the working day, Guv’nor third wheeling between us. All three of us clocking up miles of neighbourhood pavements, parks and pubs.
“The name Guv’nor always made me laugh. I think it was the apostrophe, making it sound both notorious and friendly, at least that’s what it conjured in my mind whenever the name caught my eye on the bike. I liked to imagine he was a formal chaperone keeping tabs, reporting back on the early days of us, becoming an us.
“The bike never felt nostalgic or revivalist, nor an olde worlde mode of transport, I always thought it looked so neat and chic, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on why. It would take me nearly ten years to fully understand all the nuances and ways of “Considered Things”, the subtle refinements, mindful choices or reductions that create a calm visual harmony.
“I am someone who’s only ever owned a discrete folding bike that tucks away. Which makes me unaccustomed to living with a full-size bike in the home, that doesn’t feel like a blight on your communal corridors, hallways or precious outdoor spaces. This bike doesn’t follow the trend. Standing elegantly, poised and comfortable to be admired like a piece of furniture. How does it do that?
“Like an anthropologist studying a new species, I coined the phrase “neat, aesthete, travels well” to describe how Paul appeared to me in the early days of our relationship; it was a compliment that somehow landed like a diss. To me he always appeared unhurried, elegantly prepared and enjoying the journey. To someone like me who always feels like they have the wrong shoes and one too many things in their hands for any occasion, I can only describe this as… infuriating.
“But I have been studying and decoding Paul’s ways over the years and I realise now that he is a man of cyclical rituals, small acts and decisions that have the cumulative benefit of smoothing away daily stressors in life. It’s an artform. Evidently based on a lifetime’s passion for design of objects, systems and experiences.
"A home is a dynamic living thing, with seasons and cycles that we must constantly pay attention to and revel in the fleeting joys of. When the seasons shift and you notice the low dancing light across the floors, it’s no different to the first crisp days of Autumn requiring you to dig out your gloves and thicker layers to commute in. Both examples are about being present to the world with all your senses.
“By living with and alongside Considered Things, I benefit from the smooth running of our home, a sense of calm organisation, pragmatism and beauty in every room, cupboard and drawer (except my own wardrobe, cupboards and desk, I’ll admit).
"When we were dreaming up the idea of The Townhouse Bicycle, on one of our many conversational walks or rides, I couldn’t tell you with certainty who coined the name, or the description of “furniture that moves”, but it certainly distilled a lot in a little. It’s an idea that balances the aspirational with the practical, discerning yet down-to-earth. Truly something to be enjoyed with all the senses.
What an elegant thought, one most befitting of the chaperone of our relationship. This collaboration has been something of a love letter, one that might inspire future stories and budding relationships yet to be written out there in neighbourhood pavements, parks and pubs.
Thank you to all at Pashley - past, present and future - for all the craft and care that goes into all that you do.
Michelle Bower-West is ‘Mrs Considered Things’, brand strategist, illustrator, and romantic.
Learn more about The Townhouse Bicycle
