Bastille’s Folding Bike Has Full-Sized Wheels But Fits Under Your Desk

French company Bastille doesn't want cyclists to compromise between storage and usability. The company is working on a "low-tech" folding bike that stands out from the competition with 27.5-inch wheels. Wheel sizes from competing folding bike brands like Brompton are closer to 16 inches, but Bastille says that its bigger bike can still fold and fit into a crowded city apartment apartment in under 10 seconds. 

The bike won’t have electrical components, like a motor or a built-in screen, which means it will have less to repair over time. Bastille includes a two-year warranty with the bike, further punctuating its durability. 

The company lists the bike’s folding time as between 5 to 10 seconds, which might seem like a stretch with a full-bodied machine. The process becomes a lot simpler, however, with the bike’s foldable seatpost, frame and stem, which users can shift to quickly store the bike away.

The bike can be folded to a length of 3 feet, a height of about 28 inches and a width of about 1 foot, making it easy to store under your desk while at work. 

As cities like NYC move forward with more bike lanes and less parking, Bicycle Habitat estimates that there are more than 75,000 bicycle thefts in NYC per year—and police recover less than 2% of stolen bikes. NYC landlords have also started banning e-bikes and scooters with lithium-ion batteries, fearing the fire risk, which leaves more space open for low-tech foldable bikes that fit into a 703 square-foot average NYC apartment. 

Bastille’s bike is available for pre-order now, with a 10% deposit. It costs €2,590 in total, or about $2,700, and should be delivered mid-next year.

Bastille’s eclectic team, which includes the engineer who invented the folding mechanism of Yoyo strollers and the former general manager of an audio engineering company, has raised $10.5 million so far.