Remembering the Goldgenie Gold Racing Bike, a Shameless Exercise in Opulence

Ever since the dawn of time, gold has been held as the universal marker of superiority, wealth, and sophistication. By this reasoning, the more gold you have to show off, the better you are as an individual, so there’s nothing to say that you can’t take even everyday objects and dip them in the precious metal. After all, what good is all your wealth if you can’t make people aware of it by shoving it in their faces?

Obviously, that’s a rhetorical question. But for many, it’s one that will be answered in the negative, and for these people, services like those provided by Goldgenie exist. Goldgenie is a London-based shop where you can take everything from a bathroom faucet or a teapot to an iPhone, a model car, or a plane, and turn it into an objet d’art by electroplating it in 24K gold. If you can afford it, whatever you have in mind can be plated with gold.

The early and mid-naughts were culturally different from today, if only in the way the rich approached the idea of luxury. Back then, it was ok to have a gold toilet seat or other items layered in the precious metal, including two-wheelers. They would not be the bicycles you could ride to the grocery store, let alone outside of city limits, but they were still functional bikes with an artsy twist to them.

These days, Goldgenie does pretty standard gold plating: iPhones and tablets, little rose brooches, the aforementioned car and plane models, watches, and the like. They have quite a celebrity clientele, too: Rihanna commissioned a microphone from them, Tyrese, Diddy, Chris Brown, and Victoria Beckham got iPhones, while others got Apple watches and other small trinkets. But back in 2014, the shop introduced something they called one of the world’s most expensive racing bikes, the 24K Men’s Racing Bike. It’s not the most creative name out there, but it still stands out for its outrageousness and shamelessness.

The 24K Men’s Racing Bike isn’t the only gold bike created in recent years, and neither is it the most expensive or the flashiest. If anything, if you’re somehow able to ignore the shine of the gold plating, it’s positively underwhelming and, maybe because of it, more impressive than similar products. According to Goldgenie, it was created for someone who isn’t afraid to court attention, even of the unwanted kind, and who has a soft spot for gold. That last part sort of goes without saying.

The bike was also created as a brilliant exercise in PR. From what we can tell, only a single one of these bikes was ever sold to “a local Emirate,” yet the London shop got a lot of media attention because of it. Sticking to the same recipe, when Goldgenie opened a second shop in Dubai just last year, they added another one of those bikes (though not a racing model this time) and a scooter as static displays. As the saying goes, if it ain’t broke, there’s no sense in fixing it.

The first gold bike was actually a still-functional Giant racing bike, with an aluminum frame. Every element on the bike was electroplated and covered in gold, and a limited edition San Marco suede saddle was added. SR4 racing tires still revealed the racing nature of the now-unrecognizable bike, but once the conversion was complete, the only “racing” it still did was for TV cameras.

The plan was to offer the model as a base for further customization, with a starting price of £250,000, which was approximately $400,000 at the time. Goldgenie mentioned diamond inserts on the bike, but never specified their number of carats or their location. They were clear, though, that they would offer the possibility to add more precious stones, including rubies and sapphires, and a range of fine leathers for the saddle and handlebars. After all, if you could afford it, they wouldn’t say no to other customization ideas.

“The ultimate once-in-a-lifetime gift for yourself or someone truly special” came in a special gift box, with a lifetime warranty, a certificate of authenticity, and free worldwide delivery. It also came with the mention that it was “designed to be admired,” which was a very delicate way of saying that you could only show it off indoors.

Was this bike - and others like it - overrated and unnecessary? For all its insistence that it was an object of art, could it be described as a gross and quite shameless display of wealth? Yes and yes, but you have to give it props for owning its shamelessness and embracing all its golden glory.