Dressing up in retro style, bicycle enthusiasts ride their two wheels to show their support for Car-Free Day. Xu Junqian joins the fun event in Shanghai.

On a breezy September Shanghai dusk, Elvis Presley, Charlie Chaplin, Audrey Hepburn and a bunch of bow-tied gentlemen and qipao-wrapped ladies grabbed their bicycles, or tricycles, and set out from the city's century-old Shiliupu Dock to join their first Shanghai Vintage Ride.

Of course, these legendary figures are long gone. Those seen in September were housewives, businessmen, engineers and not surprisingly, fashion designers, who dressed up like the famous stars. They share a common interest in two-wheels amid the nation's general craze for automobiles, and decide to "take some real action" days before the World Car-Free Day on Sept 22.

The event was inspired by London Tweed Run, a stylish bike ride that started in 2009, in which participants dressed up in tweeds in Britain.

Shanghai Vintage Ride is a copycat of the London version except for the looser dress code: cyclists can put on anything that is considered retro. The Shanghai version includes an 8-kilometer ride through the city's most historical parts and a catwalk show prior to the ride. The "best-dressed cyclist", based on votes by all participants, receives an Italian hand-made bicycle worth 10,000-yuan ($1,634).

The two-hour event, according to its organizers, 700bike.com, a "bicycle culture promoting" website, is aimed at bringing back bicycles to the "bicycle kingdom".

"Considering the population of cyclists on Chinese streets, we may still be the kingdom," says Bian Fujun, co-founder of the Beijing-based website. "But bikes have been downgraded from the most sought-after family property decades ago, to a cheap traffic tool ridden mainly by the elderly and poor, leaving young people interested in the vehicle in a rather embarrassing situation.

"Young people are boring these days, all of them focusing on either houses or cars, or both. I am not saying that's bad, but there's got to be something more fun than that," Bian says.

The 32-year-old Shandong native founded 700bike.com a year ago in Beijing with two of his friends because of their common interest in bicycles. They also believe the revival of bicycles is an inevitable trend that has already materialized in Europe, where the craze for automobiles has been "put out" by heavy pollution and traffic jams.

"I am not an anti-automobile activist. I drive in Beijing because it's too big a city. But whenever possible, I choose the bicycle," he adds.

The Vintage Ride attracted more than 400 people of all ages when it debuted in Beijing in April, four times the original registered participants, to take a ride donning costumes.

The Shanghai ride had nearly 300 people, old and young, expatriates and Chinese, packing the small square by the dock like a busy film set from the 1920s. Each participant paid 100 yuan to register for the event, and brought their own bicycles, preferably, also vintage-style.

"Events of this kind are very rare in Shanghai, if not all over China," says 38-year-old Wang Qin, a professional manager in the telecommunication industry in Shanghai.

The mother of two teenage boys brought her whole family, including her 70-year-old mother, for the event she considers "appropriate for everyone". They have prepared for weeks for their unified dress code: the golden age of 1920's oriental Paris.

As Wang and her mother wrap themselves in curvy tailor-made qipao and sport finger wave wigs, the three gentlemen - father and the two sons - look like three newsboys, in different sizes, with suspended tweed trousers, long socks and newsboy caps.

"It's fun, and better than the fancy dress parties where you dress up and have nothing to do but drink. Besides, I'd love to have my boys have some impression of vintage Shanghai," says Wang.

Was she worried about having difficulties riding a bicycle in the tight qipao? Not at all, according to Wang, a Shanghai native, adding that people of her age were "trained" to ride bicycles in any clothes through the narrow zigzags of Shanghai lanes.

Joyful atmosphere fills the day of the event.

A cool Harley aficionado, dressed as a cowboy, is a shrewd trader by day, encouraging almost every passer-by to have a ride on his 30,000-yuan Harley-style-inspired bicycle.

A teenage girl, with her pet Corgi in the bicycle basket, patiently stands and poses for photographers. But the person who attracts the most attention is the owner of a famous vintage shop in town, who made his public debut in the green uniforms of 1950s' China.

Xin Han, who dresses to look like Elvis Presley, says he decided to imitate the king of rock'n' roll because he wanted to try something unusual.

"I am not a big fan of Presley, in fact, but I love the looks of his time, and I have never tried that look before," he says, adding that while studying in the United States, dressing up in weird costumes was a monthly activity he did with his wife, who dons a polka-dot skirt.

Contact the writer at xujunqian@chinadaily.com.cn.

(China Daily USA 10/10/2013 page8)