Scappa aims to offer bespoke luxury bicycles

At a plush five star hotel in central London, Italian manufacturer Scappa Bicycles unveiled their lofty ambitions to offer luxury bespoke road bikes where the sky's the limit for prices: their top-end Purosangue frame starts at £9,000.

Scappa was first conceived in 2010 by Austrian Gernot Müller, who claims 27 years in the cycling industry. He had a desire to produce dream bikes, fully hand-built in Italy to meet a customers every need and craving. They’re custom measured bespoke frames with very high attention to detail, made using the tube-to-tube construction method that allows complete customisation more easily than producing expensive moulds.

The range includes three road bikes, a women’s road bike, one time trial model and a mountain bike. The company names itself after the Italian for ‘escape’, and the model names are drawn from horse breeds. They make good use of the horse logo across the frames, by way of a reminder. 

The top-end road frame is called the Purosangue (pictured at the top of the article) and offers a claimed weight of just 630g for an unpainted 55cm frame. A coat of paint will add about 60g, and Gernot reckoned that blue is the lightest colour to choose, if you wanted a painted frame.

Of course the frame and its geometry is completely custom, and you can choose details like internal or external cable routing, PressFit or external bottom brakcet, seatpost size and many other details. There’s no off-the-shelf frame. Prices start from £9,000 for the frame, with any build available.

There's some very nice details, like the dropouts and the shape of the tube profiles.

For sportive and endurance riders there’s the Giara, which has a tubeset designed to offer greater comfort, with geometry adjusted to suit such riding. It’s a claimed 1,040g for a 55cm frame. It's a little more affordable as well, with frame prices starting from around £3,700.

The Furioso is their aero road frame (which wasn't available to photograph), with aero shaped tube profiles to reduce drag. It’s a little heavier at 940g for a size 55cm.

For women cyclists they’ve developed the Racy Tracy. Gernot with his partner Diane Heyn have together developed this model to meet the different demands of women, with a shorter top tube, compact rear triangle and adjusted geometry. Frame weight for a 53cm is a claimed 930g.

The Stronzetta is a time trial bike, which they didn’t have built up in time for the launch, but that’s better for showing off its sleek lines.

The head tube is cut low to allow the stem to be recessed, and produce a compact front end. The seat tube curves around the rear wheel, the seat stays are angled low to reduce drag and the rear brake is mounted below the bottom bracket.

Scappa were keen to get across their message that they're clearly aiming these bikes at those people who want a completely unique bike made to measure, and can afford to meet the high price such a bike commands. We’ll hopefully get to swing a leg over a test bike later in the year so we can see how they ride. In the meantime check out www.scappa.it for more info.