Kits For Women, By Women

Over the years of cycling, I have watched the slow growth of women’s specific products by major cycle industry providers, while women’s specific bike shops like Cycle Chic, VeloVixen, Pedal Chic, Cycling For Girls, Terry Bicycles, Team Estrogren, Liv Cycling, and Eleanor’s NYC have come out of the battle to meet the demands of women. While the availability of women’s kits and accessories by major brands have been accessible to women online, florals, pinks, and paisley patterns don’t speak to many women who have a knack for stylish and form fitting bike wear.

With so many indie brands coming up, a shift in design has taken hold of cyclist with bright bold edgy patterns that also cater to women’s stylish appeal. However, the availability of these products for women come after catering to the male demographic, making it difficult for women to find kit that speaks to them. With women’s cycling on the rise, a wave of women’s centric brands have launched exclusive line’s to meet the demands of women’s unique body types and comfort for those long miles on the road. To highlight, these women’s specific brands are found by women and hope to create quality women’s cycling clothing while building community around empowering women on rides.

With the rise of cool ass kits, these women’s specific cycling apparel companies are taking charge in creating some of the most beautiful kits that’s worth the loyalty and money.

Machines For Freedom
MFF has been the women’s kit pioneer straight from my hometown Los Angeles, California. MFF was found by an avid cyclista who was done with gear that left her hurting after long rides and decided to make something better for women. With an understanding that the cycling community has many qualities to offer women in adventure, community, and fitness, the founder wanted to provide women with the right and stylish gear to accomplish those things. This has to be one of the most beautiful and loved kits on the market to date. Reviews rave about this brand for their design, fit, style, comfort, and fabric. This is what every girl dreams of wearing when putting in some serious miles.

Not only does MFF provide beautiful cycle kit for women, they also provide a bike and brunch ride, weekely rides, and training events to encourage women to ride and connect. That’s what I call “women helping other women.”

Fondo
Fondo’s philosophy is what every women’s cycling brand hopes to do: inspire women to go the distance and perform their best. An Australian brand started by three women who love cycling and found it hard to find quality women’ cycling kits launched Fondo together. Along with their philosophy, they’ve designed a range of women’s cycling kits that are comfortable, high quality, and edgy in style. They even send you matching nail polish with your kit.

Fondo also partners with Trek to play an active role in women’s cycling to encourage participation and inspiration for women in rides and races. Their team leads rides and supports women who are interested in cycling as a sport and lifestyle.

Hummingbird AthleticHummingbird is a new line of women’s specific and unisex cycling apparel. Designed in Los Angeles, California and made responsibly in the USA and Europe by skilled craftspersons with a long tradition of producing quality cycling wear.

Hummingbird Athletic makes look gooding on-and-off the cycling products that accommodate women cyclists from enthusiasts to professional level racers. They also hold weekly rides called the Really Really Fun Ride open to all levels of cyclists with a social spin to it.

Forward Cycling  Forward Cycling is a women’s cycling apparel brand as much as it is an cycling advocacy and sustainability brand. Forward is a line for women cyclists designed by women cyclists. Beyond Forward’s women’s kit offerings,  they are deeply committed to contributing to good causes. Ten percent of any purchase on jersey goes to Bikes Without Borders, SPCA, and Imagine 1. Additionally Forwards garments are fabricated by JL Velo, a company in cycling apparel manufacturing out of California with sustainable practices using recycled fabrics and solar energy. Social responsiblity and giving back has never looked so good.    

Peppermint Cycling Peppermint Cycling was founded by Michèle Bastien and Véronik Bastien, twin sisters overflowing with passion about cycling and aiming to create an engaging brand for women in all forms of cycling from racing, mountain biking, spin, adventure cycling, and road. Pepperment is about the overall experience of women’s cycling: laughing with friends, sharing stories, girls talk, enjoying coffee breaks and much more. This has influenced their main focus as a brand to be more than just a product brand it also tries enhance the experience of cycling around it. By having a unique and distinctive approach, they wish to make it easier for women to enjoy riding and fall in love with cycling with style, comfort, and community.

Susy Cyclewear In 2015 brand owner Susy started road cycling. One morning she woke up, took one look at her cycling clothing and decided “These outfits can look so much nicer. This needs to change. I can do a better job at this. I’m going to start my own stylish cyclewear brand in women’s cycling clothing.” She started sharing her dream and the response was so enthusiastic, it gave her the strength to start Susy Cyclewear. While women’s road cycling was coming up in the world, more and more women made transitions from the indoor cycling to the road. While women’s athletic wear thrived, women’s cycling clothing was falling behind. Susy tackled everything she thought needed improvement: styling, fabrics, colors, looks, attention to detail and most of all, fit. From spin clothing to road kit, Susy has it stylishly covered.

Femme Velo Femme Velo is another great women’s cycling apparel brand coming out of a time when proper women’s kit options was very limited. Founder, Nicole Adamson came to cycling in adulthood and got hooked. Her experience of shopping for a bike and gear highlighted a couple of necessities for women’s cycling experience and kit that eventually led her to create Femme Velo. FV aims to inspire women by having a story and concept for every piece of kit they develop such as the Alfonsina, named after Alfonsina Strada, the first woman to ever race three major tours when a career in cycling was not allowed.

Findra Alex Feechan – a keen mountain biker and experienced fashion designer spotted a gap in the market for well designed performance clothing and bike wear for women. As an experienced fashion designer Alex felt the products available suffered from the ‘shrink it and pink it’ approach, which is when companies just make smaller versions of men’s products, with added pink so you know they’re geared to the female consumer. Determined to change that, Alex set about creating a range of innovative performance lifestyle clothing which fuses fashion and performance raw materials in a new and innovative way. The result: female friendly, beautifully made, quality cycling clothes.

Queen Of The Mountain (QOM) QOM is made of of two friends, Amy Lukritz & Seb Mitaros. With a shared love for adventure they found the company when their adventure on bike needs weren’t being met and they were hearing hte same from their female riding buddies. As a way to address those needs, they began providing well priced and high quality women’s specific cycling apparel that looks good, feels great & rides well.   Women’s Kit, a website launched to cover women’s kit’s and cycling puts it plainly… “Just because you have a women’s kit doesn’t mean you have a kit for women”. Like I’ve always said, women are going to lead the cycling revolution and these brands are the forerunners for us to look to. If you’re a women’s kit company, please don’t hesitate to give me a shout to feature your company on this growing list. Thanks!