Jonah Birns, 37, senior art director for NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment, is also the creative director of the Brooklyn-based Red Hook Criterium, an unsanctioned, fixed-gear race that sells out in minutes. Here’s how he uses the power of design to bring cycling to the masses.
I have a BFA in multimedia, whatever that means. I didn’t attend a graphic design program. I was lucky in that I knew people who were incredibly good designers. I was able to watch them and see how they assembled things.
I was intrigued by logos and posters. I remember being really young and looking at the old logo for the US Postal Service, which was an eagle in profile. I was really confused by it—I couldn’t read what the image was. One day it kind of snapped into place for me. It was like a door opened and I could see things in a different way.
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In honor of Red Hook’s 10th season, which kicks off April 29 in Brooklyn, “We’ll look back at past stuff”—such as these limited-edition posters, track
__bike (below), and cap—says Birns.
Photograph courtesy of Jonah Birns When I was little, my dad would put me on the back of his steel Zebrakenko and take me out to East River Drive in Philadelphia. When I got older we’d ride together. As a teen I had an offer to train with a former pro. I turned it down because I wanted to be a dumb teenager. I became a __bike messenger the day I turned 17 and continued throughout college. I raced a few alley cats in Philadelphia and New York City when I was a bit older. I took messengering seriously, but didn’t take bike racing seriously.
In 2006, I rode from Rome to Naples with a friend on track bikes. In Rome, we met a guy, JT, who lived in New York City. About a year later, he texted me. He was living in Brooklyn with Red Hook Crit [RHC] race director, David Trimble. In 2009 JT invited me to race the second RHC. I didn’t want to race, but I went and took pictures. It still had that hidden New York feel. The third year, Dave was looking to make a bigger splash. I sketched out a little poster and came up with a logo and designed a shirt.
I was initially responding to bike race promotions. I love ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s cycling posters, whether it’s day races, Six Days, or spring Classics. There’s a grand history of beautiful cycling art that’s kind of gotten lost. We did a year where everything from posters to apparel to bikes was inspired by motorsports, like old 24 Hours of Le Mans posters and cars. We’ve done years where everything was nautical themed. I’ve looked toward fine art recently—this past year a lot of the work was influenced by minimalism and geometric abstraction. You want somebody to stop and for it to stick in their mind for just a moment. I think that’s the trick with design, especially for something like a poster.
I did a poster in 2011 that was an overhead image of a bicycle, helmet, gloves, shoes, champagne, and our old cobblestone trophy. The image was inspired by a poster of track cycling at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, when former messenger Nelson Vails won silver. The design was able to project what RHC was to become.
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Photograph courtesy of Jonah Birns
Red Hook Crit was always intended to exist in a space that hadn’t been there before. We weren’t a pro race or an alley cat or a messenger race. The Monster Track crowd can appreciate it. A gran fondo crowd can appreciate it. Before, you didn’t really have an event that could encompass those two worlds.
If we hadn’t invested energy into creating the brand, the event would have had a much harder time crossing over from its raw, street-race roots. It was a deliberate choice to create this more refined feel to RHC so that people outside of the little world it started in would gain interest. The RHC lasts only a few hours and is attended by about 10,000 people, but the artwork, videos, and apparel are seen by many times that number. Everyone with a poster on their wall or a jersey on their back becomes an ambassador for RHC and has helped it grow.
Simpler and bolder is always better. I’ve spent all this time designing frames or jerseys or other apparel, and then you see someone in the race wearing it at 30 miles an hour. Designing something to be seen not just from one side, but from every angle, was very challenging.
We’ve taken this thing so far. I was out with my daughter going to buy diapers and got an email from David with a letter from the Smithsonian. They wanted some of our pieces for their archive. I sat in my car and couldn’t say anything. And then I started yelling and laughing.
3 TIPS FOR DESIGNING YOUR OWN bike STUFF
1. “Be open to inspiration from anywhere, whether it’s walking around a museum or a city, or looking at a website or social feed.”
2. “Don’t get too tied to an idea. Be in a place where you’re ready to float from one idea to the next.”
3. “You earn a good design by putting effort and research in the front end. Look at what people are wearing and how they’re responding to things other people are doing. The more time you spend looking, thinking, and planning, the better product you’ll get.”
