Cyclist
Meet the maker: Driss Boucif of Boucif Custom Bikes
Driss Boucif is a man who lives and breathes bikes. When he’s not riding them he’s scouring scrap heaps for his next frame to upcycle. And when he’s not busy tinkering away in his workshop-cum-skatepark, you can probably find him pulling wheelies through the streets of Leuven, Belgium, with his band of merry youths.
‘Ah yes, Wheelie Wednesday! It’s great – we’ve been doing it for about three or four years. Everybody meets up at the workshop, then we eat something and go riding around the city on our back wheels. If any of the youngsters don’t have a bike to ride, they can take one from me.
‘Usually the first stop is the skate shop to say hi to the guys there, then we’ll head to get some drinks for everyone. It’s a real nice thing. A lot of great young kids come along from all different backgrounds – it’s cool to see.’
Boucif occasionally puts his front wheel on the ground too. In fact, when we catch up over the phone, he’s currently part way through a transcontinental bikepacking trip from his native Belgium to Bilbao, Spain.
Clik here to view.
‘It’s heavy, but we’re enjoying it,’ he laughs. ‘We just reached France, which was our goal for the day. But yeah, it was bad rain and we were all a bit sick too. Still, we made it in the end.’
Boucif’s bike of choice for the trip is naturally one of his own creations. He has been building frames since his teenage years after initially studying to fix mopeds. Now he runs a workshop out of Leuven’s first indoor skatepark – a vision he helped his friends bring to life using his practical skills. Here Boucif makes all manner of bicycles, but it’s his recycled step-through frames for which he is best known.
‘I found a technique to rework a classic women’s frame,’ Boucif explains. ‘It involves cutting out the top tube, flipping it and welding it back in.
Clik here to view.
‘I started working this way rather than building frames from scratch because I really didn’t have another option. Framebuilding isn’t accessible for a young chap with no money, and this way it doesn’t have to be that expensive. Most of the frames I get either from scrap yards or as donations from my clients.
‘Some of them are a good 40 years old, but being plain-gauge steel they age pretty well. I actually appreciate the simplicity of working this way now. It’s functional too, because the whole frame basically works like a giant leaf spring.’
Hump-backed bike
The bike pictured is perhaps the most polished version of Boucif’s signature upcycled step-through frames. It’s one he built specially for Bespoked 2023, where he hosted a stall as part of Sram’s Inclusivity Scholarship. It’s an initiative designed to promote diversity at the event, offering participants the opportunity to display their work and a chance to build their show bikes out with top-end componentry.
Clik here to view.
‘We wanted to do something really special as it was a special opportunity,’ says Boucif. ‘We had a meeting about parts, and at first I just asked for simple stuff like maybe some friction shifters and a seven-speed, but they were like, “No, no, no, we’re going to kit you out properly.” They offered me the rainbow-drip chain too, so obviously I took that.
‘We got all these parts and I was envisioning making a bike for racing through the city. I was thinking nice big slick tyres and stuff like that. We ended up going with 35mm at the front and 40mm at the back. I like to do it this way because generally the back tyre takes more weight, and I think it makes things look a little sharper overall. I also wanted to go with nice narrow bars for zipping through tight city streets and alleys.
Clik here to view.
‘Then I got looking for a worthy frame. I ended up using a Ludo – they’re the old Belgian frames I really like.
‘Usually I leave the finishing pretty rough, but I wanted to do the parts justice so I took the time to get everything right. I even had one of my skater friends engrave the forks for me, stuff like that. The build itself didn’t actually take too long, although I did put a lot of time into the finishing. Oh, apart from disc brake flat mounts – they were a pain in the ass.’
Clik here to view.
At first glance, you might assume the frame is powder-coated, but it’s actually graffiti paint – a nod to Boucif’s second love: ‘I’m a big fan of graffiti. I don’t write myself, but I’m a graffiti dealer. It’s actually really good paint. I mean, it’s not like powder coat but it does the job well. It goes on easy and when it scratches it’s very easy to touch up. It’s almost easier to touch it up than to clean it.
Fancy a frame for yourself? The good news is Boucif likes to keep his rates affordable. It varies from frame to frame, but generally prices are capped at around €1,000. ‘Obviously it will change over time because of inflation, but most frames I sell now are between €550 and €800, with €1,000 as the upper limit.’
• This article originally appeared in issue 152 of Cyclist magazine. Click here to subscribe
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