Lou wrote:
Jerry, I agree with you about the superb finish of a Baylis frame. But, the one on Ebay wasn't painted by Brian Baylis. Nothing against the excellent work from Cyclart, but for $3000 for a used Baylis, I would want Baylis paint too. Lou Deeter, Orlando FL
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I concur with Lou. Brian Baylis does paint like just about no-one else. Aside from certain distinctive touches (likes running the lug finish itself down the edge of the lug to the tube, something very few painters do unless you ask them to, and even then they don't do it quite like Baylis does...and the result is indescribable...as someone here on this list put it once, more like sculpture than doing it the other way, with the lug finish running only to the edge of the lug rather than down over the thickness of the lug--the metal of the lug seems to *grow* around the tube when the lugs are finished off this way)-- Brian's paint is so thin you can see every detail of the metal finish beneath, which, on a Baylis frame, is unlike anyone else's..supernaturally crisp and clean, not a molecule of brazing where it doesn't belong. Brian's paint is very robust too, he just applies many thin coats to get the proper effect.
I've seen a number of well-regarded frames with paint so thick you can't tell *what* the finish underneath is really like. Comparing something like to Baylis paint, or a Baylis frame painted by Baylis, is comparing walnuts to apples..
(apropos of which, I've seen Cooper frames both from the 70s and from very recently, and while they can be quite nice--I've always liked Cooper's work--they are not in the same league, finish-wise, as a Baylis. Just my opinion, worth exactly what you paid for it-- ;>)
You can't compare a Baylis frame to anyone else's, unless you've examined one carefully in the flesh, touched it, and generally gotten the look in your head. Photos don't begin to get at the aesthetic effect of a Baylis frame painted by Baylis.
Charles "wish I had two, but I have only one" Andrews SoCal
"What concerns me is not the way things are, but rather the way people think things are."
- Epictitus