Family Ties

Parents, siblings, partner, kids... they're all inspiration for Kev Pollock of No-ni Cycles

- Words Paddy Maddison Photography Andrew Grant

'A kid-sized, bright pink Peugeot with drop bars,' Kev Pollock says fondly as he recalls his first bike. 'I must have been about seven. I'd seen it in the window of a local shop. We had no money growing up but my mum managed to buy it for me one Christmas, paying it off over months through one of those old Christmas Clubs shops used to run. That's always stayed with me. I was totally smitten.'

He didn't know it back then, but that pink Peugeot foreshadowed a life on two wheels. Pollock remembers building dodgy BMX ramps as a teen, weekend mountain bike trips to Glentress in his twenties and cruising on slicks after university. He is now an artist and furniture designer, but bikes have been a constant.

'These days, cycling's more about headspace than anything else,' he says. 'It's that chance to switch off and get out into nature, reset a bit. Life feels so hectic right now so I don't ride as much as I'd like, but it's always there.'

It might be about headspace but, speaking to Pollock, it's clear that there's another aspect to his cycling: family. A doting father, he delights in his five-year-old son's fascination with bikes and has wasted no time introducing him to the workshop.

'I think we might try and make his next frame together. He's a dab hand with the MIG [welder] already. It's nice seeing cycling come full circle.'