Hobbs of Barbican History: A Timeline of Key Frame-Building and Product Events

Albert Hobbs started his business at what is now the Barbican Centre in central London, then an outwork rather than the gateway or military outpost the term is commonly associated with today.

The earliest-dated Hobbs of Barbican model, a Raceweight, was commercially produced. Hobbs’ business took off quickly and continued gaining momentum through the 1930s and into the very early 1940s.

The Hobbs of Barbican catalog featured the Continental model, built with Reynolds 531 steel, a Continental-type fork crown, Dunlop tires and accessories such as an oil gun and air pump. The catalog also featured the Continental Superbe, a similar but higher-spec model, and described the Criterium as welded throughout and filed to minute perfection to improve looks and strength of the joints.

British involvement in the Second World War began, and Hobbs suffered mightily as London faced severe casualties and physical damage and the robust pre-war cycling market vanished. Hobbs was forced to move his operation out of the Barbican and into Sterling Works at Dagenham.

Victory in Europe Day did not end Hobbs’ war-related hardships. Hobbs had located his frame-building business in the same factory that housed construction of Sterling and Owen machine guns, and his bicycle business was eventually forced out of that factory for national security purposes.

According to the Veteran-Cycle Club, Hobbs changed its serial-numbering system to the one used for the remainder of its time as a major frame-builder: frame numbers were prefixed by a letter indicating the build month, with the remainder of the number beginning with the digit indicating the year. Thus frame number B7500 was built in July 1947. This differed from the prior post-war system, which used a six, seven or eight digit number with the first two digits indicating the year of build.

The Sportsweight model, available with Kromo tubing, was reviewed in an issue of “Cycling” magazine and met with favor, with the reviewer dubbing it “A good, standard, lightweight bicycle at a moderate price.” By this year the Hobbs of Barbican line had also expanded to include the Blue Riband Tricycle and two tandem models, the Superbe and the Race Lite.

The Hobbs of Barbican catalog featured several Kromo-tubing models including the Clubweight and Sportsweight. By this year the Blue Riband came in three models: Continental, Professional and Championship, the last distinguished by its scroll and spearpoint lug design and customized for each buyer.

Hobbs of Barbican finally succumbed to market forces after subsisting for several years as a retail-only operation, the frame-building side of the company having ended earlier.

A brief resurgence of the brand produced a limited run of the venerable Blue Riband model, though several collectors have since speculated the new production run was simply an effort to use up extra lugs that had been sitting around for years.