I would like to take this opportunity to introduce you to my friend, and source of inspiration for our urban bike styling, Felicia Shelton. You may remember her as the first face on the Basket & Bike website. What fun we had on our very first photo shoot. It was a windy, and cold, November day, but the light in the Virginia countryside was perfect.

Felicia keeps up our Basket&Bike Pintrest account and is about to embark on an exciting trip that has real impact for Richmond and Virginia. Traveling to Copenhagen on her own dime, Felicia will be staying in the heart of this city hailed as a shining example for two-wheel travel as a way of life. Cycling in Copenhagen has been made easy for Danes with 200 miles of bike lanes, most added since 2006 when the city made a determined effort to become a biking capital. Commuters, children, teens, moms, dads, the elderly, shoppers, are all darting around town on errands, to work, meetings, to lunch; and looking stylish doing so! Richmond is on the cusp of embracing just such a global cycling culture, adding bike lanes and a bike share program in the heart of the city; linking museums, cafes, popular restaurants, shops and neighborhoods. Basket & Bike encourages biking as an everyday and normal mode of transportation and sees the bicycle as a wonderful extension of your individual style, in any season, right here in Virginia. Be it a flare for dresses, shorts and loafers, jeans and heels, capes, tote bags, or scarves, biking can be freeing and fun.

As Felicia Shelton takes to the bike lanes of Copenhagen June 21 - June 29, she will be in search of the very best fresh ideas to highlight for her own, newly rebranded blog, Non Pave. (Click here or in the title for a terrific blog on Non Pave by Felicia's branding partner, the Routine Creative.) This happy, spirited Richmond public schoolteacher, with a wanderlust and delight for clean Scandinavian styling will bring to Basket & Bike and Richmond a view into who and what we can become on two-wheels. She's traveled the world and lived in France, Sweden and Korea but, FOR NOW, as she likes to say, she sees the beauty and excitement, the energy and light that is RVA.

Richmond already has an outstanding local culture, and is ready for stylish commuter biking to connect to it, with a fresh Virginia breeze on our faces, power in our legs, and the empowerment to change how we choose to live our daily lives, loving life in Richmond, in Virginia, and reducing our carbon footprint on the world. As Felicia highlights in Non Pave, Being ourselves. Feeling at home. On the Road. Basket & Bike is excited to assist Felicia with a photographer in Copenhagen to bring back photos and video highlighting her jaunts via Dutch bicycle to share. Join me in wishing Felicia a very happy Bon Voyage and a hearty thank you for letting us all come along for the ride.

Bisous Felicia • Let's Ride!

Anne Poarch • Founder • Basket & Bike

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