A Royal Flush for PokerStars that's all about the details

Spoon Customs Izoard XCR in Pokerstars ‘racing’ livery with Campagnolo Super Record EPS and Bora WTO Wheels. Pic Simon Eldon.

When I first started dreaming about how Spoon Customs might work I had a inkling that brands might be interested in what we could do. They need to reach people and connect with them in new ways and we might have some ideas about how to do that, through our work. 

Campagnolo Super Record EPS 12 with Columbus XCR Stainless steel and 24k gold leaf from Gun Control Custom Paint. Pic Simon Eldon.

I had had a few enquiries over the years, but none landed with such a good fit as the Pokerstars project did. 

The project started with a call in the middle of lockdown asking us to help out with a project themed around the Tour De France. PokerStars customers were also cyclists and their marketing team wanted to do something to raise awareness of that fact, and in the process connect a growing cohort of bike fans to what they do in a meaningful way. 

Pokerstars branding in 24k Gold Leaf shown with Custom painted Columbus Futura Disc forks. Pic Simon Eldon.

They decided to give something really tangible away to their fans, by producing a really high specification, one-off bicycle and asked us to design it for them. Incorporating their branding. They wanted to order five of them. In the best ‘dream build’ specification possible. 

Each bike was given a card and an individual ID from a Royal Flush. This one is #1 the Ace of Spades. Pic Simon Eldon.

We jumped at the chance to help and after some back and forth with Sam, then Nikki at the PokerStars Head Office over in the Isle of Man, we came up with a dream specification bicycle, that would be given away to lucky fans, via an online competition marketed throughout Europe. 

It’s rare for heavily branded bicycles or race bikes to appear subtle but we wanted to focus in on subtle details. Pic Simon Eldon.

The competition was a huge success, with thousands of respondents from five countries. Having announced the winners, we reached out to the lucky winners; Damien, Klaus, Mari and Sven. But in the middle of lockdown, with massive restrictions on our movements and those of our customers, all the fitting had to be done remotely. Finding enough stainless to complete four of the five bikes ordered also proved problematic but we persevered and the frames were finally completed in the Summer.

Controls from Italy, from Campagnolo, Deda, Columbus and Prologo.

For the design of the bike’s chassis we turned to our recently UCI Approved road race bike template and flagship, Izoard XCR Disc and designed the frames around Columbus’s XCR tubesets, the highest spec steel tubing available. We were lucky to get ahead of the parts shortages and we tracked down five Super Record EPS Groupsets, with matching Bora WTO wheels. Prologo provided saddles, and long term supplier Deda took care of the contact points to complete an almost all Italian Spec sheet.

Sam Weeks at Gun Control Custom Paint painstakingly airbrushed in every detail from Lou’s PokerStars led design. PokerStars strapline ‘I’m in’ appears inside the Columbus Futura Disc fork. Pic Simon Eldon.

Then we needed to finalise the design and paint them. Long term collaborator Lou Eldon at Studio Polpetto stepped up and helped us design the nets for the brand elements of the project. Then the search started for a screen printer who could assist with the most technical branded aspects of the design. Plenty exist, but none that could do what we wanted them to do and make it work under 2k wet paint. Prototype after prototype failed QC, but with some revisions to the design, we finally overcame and eventually we had all we needed for Sam to work his magic on the final design. 

Lockdown did it’s best to cause us as many problems for the project as it could; production outages, parts supply, then most recently, me and the almost the whole team taking it in turns to go down with Covid, but we finally got paint down on the bicycles last month and they’re almost ready to go out. As usual, every one of the bikes is built with no compromise in fabrication and finish, just like our customer bikes.

24k Gold leaf details specific to each bike with an individual playing card identifying each bike in a nod to Poker’s highest scoring hand, the Royal Flush. Pic Simon Eldon.

The first frame took over 12 hours of straight graft from Sam to get each overlapping element onto the frame. Done after he’d applied the black metallic base, and contrast red fades (a normal custom paint job might have stopped there of course). 

We black anodised and grey etched a titanium headset caps to our spec, in a boltless design by Kapz. The artwork for the design is based on PokerStars own casino pokerchip design. Custom painted Deda Super Zero stems, matched with lightweight SuperLeggera carbon bars.

Everything you see in the fork was applied with masks and an airbrush and each bike is signed by us, Sam and Alberto (who expertly welded the tubes). The gold you see is also genuine 24k gold leaf, applied over Linseed Size in the traditional way.

A one-off, laser-etched Poker-chip styled titanium steerer cap finishes off each numbered build and ties the bike back to PokerStars brand once again. Thanks to Kush at SuperCaz for coming through on those. They’re one of an almost endless number of tiny details on this bike that make the whole build so special. 

Thanks to everyone involved, and thanks to the lucky winners for waiting so patiently for us to get these builds over the line. We can’t wait for you to finally get your bikes in time for Spring. 

Spoon Customs fabrication and finishing, physically signed off by some of the Spoon team’s skilled craftspeople. Pic Simon Eldon.