cycling industrial design

new product development

design process management

20 years helping visualize the future of cycling.

Hundreds of functionally, aesthetically, and commercially successful products.

Passionate about advancing the state of the cycling art, balancing creative innovation with real world experience.

Best viewed on a full screen.

Experience

31 years of new product development. 25 years consulting, 6 years in-house. Specialization in carbon fiber frame design and 3D CAD sculpting.

Stephens designed frames have raced in Kona, Moab, and on the Champs-Élysées with podium finishes on the WorldTour, World Enduro Series, and others.

Frame Design

Primary specialty - sculpting carbon fiber with automotive surfacing software. Shaped one of the first hydroformed aluminum frames in the industry with Electra in 2004. Experience in steel, titanium, and thixoformed magnesium. Road, MTB, TT / triathlon, urban, cyclocross, gravel, & electric.

Components & Accessories

Experience designing products across the cycling industry - components, computers, headlights, helmets, bottles, cages, crankarms, trainers,

indoor cycles, tools, scales, pumps, dropouts, chainrings, fenders, aero bars, cargo boxes, spin bikes, taillights, packs, racks, hubs, saddles...

Expertise

Personally designed products for over 150 brands. Product design, project management, and liaison to engineering and manufacture. Product development workflows for multidisciplinary teams involving market & product research, design resources, various engineering disciplines, rapid prototyping, and design for manufacture.

Software

Fluent in advanced surface modeling and concept visualization in 2D and 3D. Expertise in class-A surfacing with Alias Studio; experience blending sculptural surface models (Alias) with your engineering team's CAD to create complex assemblies not possible with either tool alone.

Road

Road bike experience from pro-level racing frames to fondo-friendly endurance rigs. Experience with international teams on pioneering superbikes optimized with computational fluid dynamics, and experience with daily cruisers retailing for a fraction of that cost. Mostly carbon but also steel, aluminum, magnesium (!) and Ti.

MTB

Have shaped hardtails, cross-country racers, all-mountain cruisers, enduro frames, downhill rigs, off-road singlespeeds, gravel bikes, and cyclocross frames.

Whether rigid, flexible by design, or fully suspended, the goal is to maximize structural integrity, optimize dynamic performance, and look great doing it.

Electric

Experience with mid- and hub-drive systems from Bosch, Shimano, Fazua, Bafang, and Mahle/eBikeMotion.
Initially a skeptic, now a convert. More bikes = fewer cars. Just plain fun.

TT / Triathlon

Personally a triathlete with experience designing both a non-UCI-legal integrated triathlon superbike with ergonomic features new to the industry and

a major brand UCI-legal time trial bike currently raced on the WorldTour with podium finishes at the Tour and several national championships.

Urban

Experience designing commuters, cruisers, and e-bikes. Some for utility, for efficient commuting practicality. Some for style...beach cruisers, retro designs...nostalgia for a simpler day. All with the idea that a bicycle should combine thoughtful design with healthy dose of cool.

CAD surfacing

For those who already have a design, but need it executed in CAD - carbon sculpting in Alias is a skill developed over 20 years.

Automotive A-class surfacing. Because no matter how good you are with Solidworks, it's not the appropriate tool for this:

Accolades & Reviews

Named on 20 patents and 10 international design awards including 4 Eurobike Gold Awards. Podium finishes at the Tour de France,
World Enduro Series, and several national championships. Niner Air 9 named one of the 25 most important bikes ever designed by MBA magazine.

But don't just take my word for it...

“The LeMond Prolog is a bike that we could almost run out of superlatives in describing, and it has easily made our list of bikes that are in the running for our Bike of the Year honors.”
- Electric Bike Action

“One of the most beautiful upright-style bikes, electrified or not, I’ve ever laid my eyes on.”
- Wall Street Journal

“The Prolog comes closer to being perfect than eny ebike I’ve tried before.” “There is...one very good reason to buy this bike, and that’s if it makes your heart sing. The Prolog does this to every bike person I know, including me.”
- Wired

Clients & Brands

Some of the 150+ brands for which millions of dollars of product has been personally designed in 25 years:

Avenir logo

Budnitz logo

Camelbak logo

Cannondale logo

Columbia logo

CycleOps logo

DDK logo

Diamondback logo

1/4

Personal

Underpromise. Overdeliver.

Colorado based. Occasional triathlete. Extremely proud dad.

Passionate about creativity, personal integrity, and being easy to work with. Request the same of my clients.

Portfolio | Road + Gravel

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | MTB

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | Urban + Electric

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | Cycling Related

Click any image for a larger view

2021 LeMond road bike frame sketch - 3k.jpg

cycling industrial design

new product development

design process management

20 years helping visualize the future of cycling.

Hundreds of functionally, aesthetically, and commercially successful products.

Passionate about advancing the state of the cycling art, balancing creative innovation with real world experience.

Best viewed on a full screen.

Experience

31 years of new product development. 25 years consulting, 6 years in-house. Specialization in carbon fiber frame design and 3D CAD sculpting.

Stephens designed frames have raced in Kona, Moab, and on the Champs-Élysées with podium finishes on the WorldTour, World Enduro Series, and others.

Frame Design

Primary specialty - sculpting carbon fiber with automotive surfacing software. Shaped one of the first hydroformed aluminum frames in the industry with Electra in 2004. Experience in steel, titanium, and thixoformed magnesium. Road, MTB, TT / triathlon, urban, cyclocross, gravel, & electric.

Components & Accessories

Experience designing products across the cycling industry - components, computers, headlights, helmets, bottles, cages, crankarms, trainers,

indoor cycles, tools, scales, pumps, dropouts, chainrings, fenders, aero bars, cargo boxes, spin bikes, taillights, packs, racks, hubs, saddles...

Expertise

Software

Fluent in advanced surface modeling and concept visualization in 2D and 3D. Expertise in class-A surfacing with Alias Studio; experience blending sculptural surface models (Alias) with your engineering team's CAD to create complex assemblies not possible with either tool alone.

Road

MTB

Have shaped hardtails, cross-country racers, all-mountain cruisers, enduro frames, downhill rigs, off-road singlespeeds, gravel bikes, and cyclocross frames.

Whether rigid, flexible by design, or fully suspended, the goal is to maximize structural integrity, optimize dynamic performance, and look great doing it.

Electric

Experience with mid- and hub-drive systems from Bosch, Shimano, Fazua, Bafang, and Mahle/eBikeMotion. Initially a skeptic, now a convert. More bikes = fewer cars. Just plain fun.

TT / Triathlon

Personally a triathlete with experience designing both a non-UCI-legal integrated triathlon superbike with ergonomic features new to the industry and

a major brand UCI-legal time trial bike currently raced on the WorldTour with podium finishes at the Tour and several national championships.

Urban

Experience designing commuters, cruisers, and e-bikes. Some for utility, for efficient commuting practicality. Some for style...beach cruisers, retro designs...nostalgia for a simpler day. All with the idea that a bicycle should combine thoughtful design with healthy dose of cool.

CAD surfacing

For those who already have a design, but need it executed in CAD - carbon sculpting in Alias is a skill developed over 20 years.

Automotive A-class surfacing. Because no matter how good you are with Solidworks, it's not the appropriate tool for this:

Accolades & Reviews

“The LeMond Prolog is a bike that we could almost run out of superlatives in describing, and it has easily made our list of bikes that are in the running for our Bike of the Year honors.” - Electric Bike Action

“One of the most beautiful upright-style bikes, electrified or not, I’ve ever laid my eyes on.” - Wall Street Journal

“The Prolog comes closer to being perfect than eny ebike I’ve tried before.” “There is...one very good reason to buy this bike, and that’s if it makes your heart sing. The Prolog does this to every bike person I know, including me.” - Wired

Clients & Brands

Some of the 150+ brands for which millions of dollars of product has been personally designed in 25 years:

Personal

Underpromise. Overdeliver.

Colorado based. Occasional triathlete. Extremely proud dad.

Passionate about creativity, personal integrity, and being easy to work with. Request the same of my clients.

Portfolio | Road + Gravel

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | MTB

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | Urban + Electric

Click any image for a larger view

Portfolio | Cycling Related

Click any image for a larger view

Experience with mid- and hub-drive systems from Bosch, Shimano, Fazua, Bafang, and Mahle/eBikeMotion.
Initially a skeptic, now a convert. More bikes = fewer cars. Just plain fun.

“The LeMond Prolog is a bike that we could almost run out of superlatives in describing, and it has easily made our list of bikes that are in the running for our Bike of the Year honors.”
- Electric Bike Action

“One of the most beautiful upright-style bikes, electrified or not, I’ve ever laid my eyes on.”
- Wall Street Journal

“The Prolog comes closer to being perfect than eny ebike I’ve tried before.” “There is...one very good reason to buy this bike, and that’s if it makes your heart sing. The Prolog does this to every bike person I know, including me.”
- Wired