If you are ready to carry your ride up the stairs, around the corner and down a deserted-looking hallway, Good Weather Bicycle and Repair is ready to fix your flat or custom build your bike.
“It can seem unapproachable from the street, but a lot of people are happy to have come up through this little Narnia corridor,” said co-founder Jason Marqusee of the shop’s out of the way location in a small studio on the second floor of 1520 11th Ave, above Purr.
Brandon Waterman, a designer by trade, and Marqusee, who works at Porchlight Coffee and Records in addition to Good Weather, have had the shop open for about a month now.
The two say Marqusee’s connections from serving hundreds of people coffee every week at Porchlight have been a boon for drumming up business for the shop. While much of their current business is through appointments booked by friends and acquaintances, the shop also gets a daily dose of one or two walk-ins from strangers whose curiosity about the small wooden sign on the sidewalk led them to venture upstairs.
In addition to tune-ups and small fixes, the shop has built a handful of custom bikes since its opening. A custom built bike will cost you, though: Waterman says each bike has run around $1,500 to $1,700.
Marqusee and Waterman said they also hope to grow a biking community around the shop and plan to hold monthly promotional and community building events in the space. In June they threw a party offering deals on bike helmets that brought around 100 people in the door, and the two are planning a bike light party for July 29. Marqusee also wants to hold weekly community bike rides to acclimate newer riders with the smartest, safest routes for cycling in Seattle, and ways to avoid notorious hazards like Rainier Ave or the streetcar tracks.
Good Weather joins a small but hearty bike shop scene on Capitol Hill. In November, Metier opened its massive, 12,500 square-foot gym, cafe, cycling shop, and company headquarters on E Union. A month later, a crew that gathered around Seattle’s bike polo scene opened Peloton bicycle cafe and repair shop on E Jefferson just off 12th Ave.
In the long term, Waterman and Marqusee say they would be interested in expanding into a storefront where they could add a cafe element to the bike repair shop, but for now both say they are happy working to establish Good Weather as a repair shop.
Good Weather is open from 1-7 PM every day except Wednesday and Sunday, which are by appointment only. You can learn more at goodweatherinseattle.com.
They are filling a MUCH needed void on Capitol Hill since Velo bike shop left. (It was unbelievable to me that one of the densest, most bicycle-filled neighborhoods in the state didn’t have a place to get a little bike work done.)
Welcome to the neighborhood! And thanks to Capitol Hill Seattle for reporting – or else I never would have known about it.
There’s a tiny, easy-to-miss bike shop on the north end of the hill (Branford Bike, next to the Pagliacci delivery location at 10th and Miller). To the south, Peloton (which seems as much a cafe as a bike shop) on Jefferson just off 12th. To the east, the oft-overlooked 20/20 Cycle. And in the center, there’s Métier (which seems pricey, but that’s how that part of the hood is going).