Of all the publishing houses dedicated to culture of cars and bikes, Veloce is surely the most prolific. This time, they’ve come up with something no bike obsessive and consumer of culture will be able to resist.

Alastair Walker’s book is a look back at the glory days of the Café Racer, from Friday night gatherings on London’s North Circular road, through the street specials craze of the Seventies, to the modern day revival.

From its roots in the ’59 Club, home-brewed specials and the creation of the Triton by Dave Degens, the Café Racer became the must-have Rockers’ motorbike. It then became the template for a new generation of fast road riders in the 1970s, with the rise of Dunstall, Rickman, Seeley and many more bespoke bike builders.

The big factories jumped on the bandwagon too. Machines like the Moto Guzzi Le Mans Mk I, Ducati 900SS and the MV Agusta 750S all captured the spirit of the Café Racer. Then the slick, super fast, Japanese sport bikes of the 80s came along, and looked set to consign the Café Racer special to the history books.

But a revival had to happen. The Ace Café London re-opened, bike builders as diverse as Wakan, Fred Krugger, Nick Gale and Roland Sands all began to create lean, back-to-basics motorcycles, but with their own unique twist on Café Racer heritage. From the Buell 1125 CR to the Guzzi V7 Sport, mainstream modern bikes have also re-discovered their street racing soul.

This is required reading for lovers of bikes with a beating heart.

image courtesy Deus Ex Machina.

2012: V12 Zagato All Images Zagato

The V12 Zagato is just the latest in a long line of collaborations between the house of Zagato and Aston Martin. The V12 is a snarlingly exotic but beautifully coherent design that perfectly blends the philosophies of its parents. Stainless steel exhausts, forged lightwight alloys and the distinctive flowing blends of the coachwork make this ‘ring- tweaked monster one of the greatest Zagato penned cars ever produced. Limited numbers will guarantee its resonance too.

2002: DB7 Zagato

For me this was an example of Aston Martin trying to guild a very beautiful lily. But what a success! Just 99 of these green beauties were made, with that signature Zagato ‘double bubble’ roof line and sculptured rear window. Unique interiors, tail lights and alloys made the perfectly proportioned DB7 design sing. That bulbous grille gulps air and accentuates the base – making this production car look fit for endurance racing right out the box.

1986: AM V8 Vantage Zagato.

The burly English officer here gets the Z-treatment, rounding off the edges and launching what was a rather lumpen Aston martin into the rare supercar stratosphere. Caused much ambivalence when launched in the mid Eighties at geneva, around fifty were actually produced and immediately soared in price in resale value. The convertible is even more rare, and doesn’t retain the coherence of the coupé’s design. Still, a great example of how juxtaposition of design philosophies can sometimes produce bracing results.

1960: DB4 GT Zagato.

The first Z-Aston collaboration was shunted around by racers like Stirling Moss. It was super light and super quick, with perspex and aliminium replacing the glass and steel of the rump DB4. We reckon the Zagato design inspired the more flowing design of all subsequent Aston Martin cars. With only 20 ever having been produced the price of these cars is now well into seven figures – a real piece of design and racing history.

– See more at: http://www.influx.co.uk/wordpress/features/aston-martin-x-zagato/#sthash.xAsNS8E4.dpuf

‘Serious film buffs’ often dismiss the admittedly ponderous and indulgent 1968 film from Jack Cardiff that was based on Mandiargues’s quasi surrealistic novel as a slightly ridiculous joke.

But if you dig the aesthetic of the last couple of years of the sixties, you’re interested in the idea of girls on motorbikes being slightly unnerving and subversive, then you really should take the time to hunt it down on your local bit torrent.

The clip below gives a good flavour of the feel of the film. The bike riding scenes are ludicrous but still somehow kinda cool. The Harley is almost comical and otherworldy in thc context of the French countryside. Marianne Faithful looks pretty and seductive and vaguely sinister in her skintight leather one-piece in combo with the futuristic open face lid.

But, you can’t help but notice the similarities with other films like Easy Rider and countless schlockish bikesploitation movies that equate motorcycles with freedom, rebellion and sexuality. It’s cool to witness an European take on the theme, and the main character’s interior monologues are amusing – and her encounters with randy gendarmes laugh-out loud hilarious.

Australia’s image, even deep here in the heart of the 21st century isn’t really compatible with artful postmodernism. Nor is the motorbike itself particularly associated (in the UK at least) with the tendency to fetishise the object.

Our biking tradition is fundamentally stained happily and perhaps eternally with the greasy rag. Free born Brits love bikes and dig the aesthetic of two wheeled speed – but the reflection tends to begin and end with the practicalities of saddling up and riding hard.

Contrast our died-in-the-wool mentality with the way of approaching bike culture as typified by our antipodean friends at Deus bikes in Sydney.

Part design studio, bike workshop, part café (the type that serves lattes rather than fried brekkies), Deus is a self-conscious temple of all things bikey. They will sell you a classic bike and accompanying paraphernalia, and will design and build with you your very own bespoke mutant, from Café clones like the one pictured above) to Steve McQueen-ish Desert racers and back again.

The whole idea is the brainchild of a trio of Aussie creative ruffians, one of which helped create the iconoclastic, explosively successful and delightfully subversive surf/street brand Mambo.

Whatever English biker purists might think of it, these guys have tapped beautifully into an increasingly popular creed of international classic bike enthusiast who appreciates the beauty of motorcycle culture design and engineering at a whole other level.

Placing the retail Deus experience in a beautifully designed space will generally helpfully migrate your passion for the classic side of motorcycling to the realms of high culture.

Power to their leather-patched elbows. And make mine a mocaccino.

S130 NISSAN FAIRLADY Z

We stumbled across these catalogue images of the T-topped S130 Fairlady Z this morning and it occurred to us that with the evolution of our aesthetic and the return to cool of all things vaguely ‘eighties’, it might be time to reassess how much we dig.

You don’t see this US designation much this side of the pond – and even if you did, their cooler cousins in the first gen cars have much more kudos.

But check out that period interior, check out the t-bar auto shift that mirrors the targa top. We think it might be time to invest!