Alternate Way to Install City Grips

A Black woman wearing a denim shirt is carrying a bicycle down a set of stairs in an urban environment. The bicycle has a green paint job and honey leather wrapped handlebars.

Original, unique designs to help with lifting and carrying your bicycle

Lifetime leather bar wraps in five styles for every type of handlebar and bicycle

A woman bicycling on a bright summer day over a green lawn wearing suede fringe cowgirl boots and with a 6-pack of Anchor Steam beer connected to the top tube of her bicycle with a honey leather 6-pack frame cinch

Best-selling "commuter essentials" for making the daily commute easier

A dark brown leather round, barrel-shaped saddle bag with cedar wood sides mounted to the back of a brown leather Brooks saddle on a cream-and-brown painted bicycle

Stunning handcrafted bicycle bags carry the essentials and turn heads!

Two people playing a game of travel cribbage on a wooden picnic table with a small leather and birch cribbage board

Our original best-selling Travel Cribbage Boards have fans worldwide

Two sets of travel dice on a dark brown leather table surface. Both sets show six dice coming out of a square brass tube. The dice are 7mm, smaller than standard. One has white dice and the other has black dice.

Play dice anywhere you go in a handcrafted brass keychain or necklace.

Two people playing dominoes using small, domino-sized playing cards on a walnut wood table with snacks and drinks. The domino cards are double 12 with different colors for each number and hand-drawn.

Uniquely functional for travel: hand-drawn domino playing cards (2 sizes!)

Close-up of a folding leather travel backgammon board mid-play on a weathered wood surface. A hand is reaching in and moving four game pieces (which are brass nails) between triangles, which are laser-engraved in the honey dyed leather. Accessories are visible, dice and doubling cube and peg storage

Our newest folding leather board and favorite game: Travel Backgammon!

A variety of handcrafted leather and wood handles on a sample board as seen from above and an angle

All handcrafted handles in 8 styles, 4 leather colors, & 3 metal finishes

A white chest of drawers in a white and lilac baby nursery with three colors of leather Morrison bin pull handles, in Honey, Dark Brown, and Black

Strong yet soft, durable and sustainable, no-bumps and no-bruises

Collection details, stylesheets, dimensions, sizing, palette & more

Two cabinet doors swinging open towards each other with matching leather Lovejoy loop handles. The leather touches so the cabinets don't crash into each other, a solution for problem corners in kitchen design planning

Flexible but sturdy, creative solutions to tricky problem corners

The Blog

Our blog"In a Nutshell" is written by humans:

- how-to guides

- in-depth articles

- photo essays

Valerie and Geoff from Walnut Studiolo are standing on a pile of driftwood between two boulders on the North Oregon Coast beach near Manzanita, with mountains and grey sky in the background

About Us

A long dark brown leather blueprint tube is shown on a long countertop being hand stitched together by Geoff, whose stitching hands are in the background

More Information

Valerie and Geoff Franklin of Walnut Studiolo standing behind their bicycles on a grassy green lawn. Geoff is doffing his hat to Valerie and she is smiling, as a gesture of service.

Customer Service

Leather 101

We wrote a free educational series about our favorite material, from how it's made to spotting vintage quality

This blog is written by humans.

100% written by humans.
We don't use generative A.I.

Read Our Statement on A.I.

by admin
October 13, 2020
2 min read
1 Comment

We love to hear when our clever customers find a new way to use our products. One satisfied customer, Tom in New Jersey, sent us an alternate way to sew on the City Grips that he found easier:

I finally finished my bike build, which means I've installed the city grips and...
THE GRIPS TURNED OUT GREAT! I LOVE THEM!
I did the process a bit differently though. After thoroughly soaking the leather, I chose to perform the stitching out of the handlebar. The handlebar kept getting in the way of the needle and I was always concerned with keeping the grip in the correct position.
I kept the stitches loose of course then I just slipped it on to the handlebar. Before tightening the stitches, I could then slide the grip in or out and twist it up or down to the position I want it to be. The adhesive will not have set them in place yet.

You mentioned stitching. Because of the way I did it, I felt emboldened to try the glove stitch instead of the simpler whip stitch. It really was easier stitching out of the handlebar. With the leather well soaked (over 2 hours), I wasn't worried at all that it would dry up on me. When I slipped it on the handlebar, it was still well compliant and easy to handle.

Thank you, again, for such a wonderful product. The "22" monogram ended up exactly where I envisioned it to be, in line with the "walnut" on the opposite end.

We haven't tried this ourselves yet, and we'd love to hear what you think.

Here's a small video Tom made to demonstrate how he did it:

https://youtu.be/wgriT68cyEw

Shop City Grips

1 Response

Kevin

May 08, 2025

Yes! I did something similar. Laced up the bar wraps in my lap sitting on the patio listening to music.
I was planning to use inversed brake levers, and the cables ran all the way to the end of the Velo Orange Porteur handlebars. You just slide the bar wraps on after loosely lacing them and then I positioned the seam/lace to run along the bottom with the cables to conceal them inside the bar wrap. I then used a metal hook type pick to tighten the thread. Then, with the three miles long of thread left over just neatly wrapped it about an inch on the ends and tied off. This was 12-13 yrs. ago. The bars wraps still look great!

Country