July 31, 2014

Chicago Helmet: 312 Is On The Move

They are all here! Oregon Manifest teamed up with Artcrank and Nutcase Helmets to create five original-artwork helmets that were auctioned to benefit bike organizations in five cities on July 25.

We’ve been highlighting these unique helmets as they’ve been released, and now we’re up to number 5, from one of the fastest-growing bikey cities in the U.S.: Chicago, Illinios.

Chicago joins New York, Portland, Seattle and San Francisco as the five cities that had Oregon Manifest teams working on the perfect urban bicycle. We’ll chronicle the winning bike in this space next week.

Meanwhile, the helmet from Chicago graphic designer and Artcrank artist Justin Nottke is a tribute to the fast growth of biking in the Windy City.

Justin is a designer, illustrator, screen printer, and videographer.  He’s also a proud supporter of mustaches – sporting a fairly robust one himself.

While he does daily design for a Chicago events production company, he also takes on as much freelance work as he can handle, and is especially enthused about working with musicians.

About the Chicago helmet, Justin had this to say: “My approach was to keep the design simple, but reflect how popular bike riding is in Chicago. Since moving here in 2010, I constantly see a variety of people out and riding their bikes. So I wanted to embrace that the entire city of Chicago is riding. [Area code] 312 is in constant motion.”

Justin’s bright and bracing helmet design gives that feeling of movement. To watch him in his helmet creation video, click here.

Recent work from Jason Nottke.

To check out the other City Helmet series artists’ entries: click here, here, here and here.