Paint Process

It’s not enough for a bicy­cle to be beau­ti­ful: it also has to look beautiful.

Colnago frames are hand painted and, as a result, every one is unique. Your bicy­cle is painted by the same crafts­men who paint frames for the pro­fes­sional rid­ers of Team Europcar and Colnago – CSF Inox.

A Colnago paint fin­ish is an intri­cate and beau­ti­ful job. Except for the head badge, none of the coloured areas or logos on a Colnago frame is a stick-on decal; all are the result of the painstak­ing skill of our paint team.

The paint process starts with mask­ing tape and thread pro­tec­tors to keep paint out of the parts of the frame where none is needed. Then, we apply a layer of spe­cial primer that helps the outer lay­ers bond to the car­bon fiber.

When the primer has been dried in an oven at 50 Celsius, the painter applies laser-cut mask­ing decals and then adds the first layer of paint. Several more mask­ing steps and lay­ers of paint go to build up the even­tual colour scheme.

In time, the masks are all removed to reveal the final fin­ish. The only remain­ing step is to coat the whole frame in a layer of lac­quer that stops the ultra-violet rays in sun­light from fad­ing the paint and helps pro­tect the more intri­cate areas from damage.

It’s not enough for us to inno­vate in the tech­nol­ogy of our frames, we want to make them more beau­ti­ful too.