We Instagramed a picture of this 1952 Mercian bike, which was bought new from the original Mercian shop, a ‘Whitemeadows’ Mercian. The original owner, Alan Gifford, decided to part with his dearly loved Mercian in 2019 and found it a new owner who would look after it, as he had for the past 67 years.

Alan visited the Mercian workshop and told us the history of the frame and bike so that we could restore it for the new owner, who was keen to keep it as original as possible and where possible restore it to Alan’s original specification.

The frame has been resprayed back to to it’s original Emerald Green Flamboyant, with no down tube transfers as it was when new, with just the addition of the Crowther Barker transfers and a 1950’s period Reynolds transfer. Mark added the gold highlights to the seat tube clamp and a few coats of varnish for the finishing touch.

The original components were cleaned, polished and preserved where possible, only the Gnutti chainset was impossible to find (without a remortgage), so an alternative was found and fitted.

For all the original information please see the earlier blog posts for a picture of Alan and pre-renovation bike in the workshop a year ago.

Hope you all agree this is a lovely bike, both before and after.