While bikes are, clearly, splendid things in pretty much every respect, they do have the odd drawback. Having to clean them occasionally is one, and having to keep them somewhere is another. If you're lucky enough to have a garage, shed, spare room or similar then you're probably OK. But if you happen to live in a small house or flat (or a big one shared with lots of people) you might be struggling for places to put your bike or bikes. For it's when you have more than one that the problems really start.
Of course, there's always those plastic-covered hooks from B&Q, but if you're renting then drilling holes in the ceiling isn't always an option and red hooks don't look that great at the best of times. Which is where the Michelangelo rack from theartofstorage.com comes in. It's a freestanding rack that lets you store two bikes in the floorspace previously occupied by one. The company does a range of different racks in a variety of styles, but the Michelangelo is unique because you don't need to drill any holes in anything.
It comes as a box of tubular steel bits, some bolts, an Allen key (as if you haven't got any of those) and some reassuringly clear instructions. Once assembled, you end up with a kind of A-frame construction with a pair of rubber-footed legs at the bottom, a rubber bung at the top and two pairs of rubber-coated hooks in between. Stand it up, rest the top bung against a wall and hang your bikes off it. Done.
It really doesn't look as if it should work, but it does. It'll take a lot of weight, too - those two bikes in the picture come to 70lb between them, and it's claimed to take up to 100. It's amazingly stable - it flexes a bit, but you'd actually have to pull on it pretty hard to get it to fall over.
Drawbacks? You need to be reasonably careful where you put it to avoid walking into the upper bike, especially since you're likely to end up with a pedal at about head height. And if you've got really wide bars they might clonk the wall, but then they probably did that anyway. Other than that, it could be just what you're looking for. It's surprisingly inexpensive, too.
 Neat, clever, looks good, takes plenty of weight, won't fall over, good price
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 Needs quite a bit of wall space, mind your head...
Verdict
We've seen freestanding racks before, but they've all been frighteningly expensive. The Michelangelo isn't rock-steady, but it's not going to fall over and your bikes aren't going to fall off it. Good stuff.
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