Wobbling along on a scuffed-up, muddy Lime bike is a journey that will be familiar to many commuters. But riding one to to the premiere of your new Oscar-tipped film? Less so.
That Timothée Chalamet turned up to the London red carpet of A Complete Unknown on a Lime is a new high for the clunky electric bikes, which in recent years have shifted gear from quotidian to cool.
Riding down the red carpet, struggling to get the unwieldy machine on to its stand and then apparently standing to pay for his ride, Chalamet brought Hollywood-level attention to the transportation company. Even the idea of the actor being fined £65 for parking in the wrong zone – an easy pitfall, given the sometimes confusing no-parking zones system – added to the charm.
While the company says it’s too early for it to be able to measure business impact, and is unsure who issued the fine, given its penalty structure runs from £2 to £20, the scene was undeniably valuable exposure. Ellie Bird, Lime’s UK brand leader, says it wasn’t staged: “We had no idea it was going to happen … I was on the train home when I saw the first picture. I sent a message to my colleague saying, ‘Isn’t this good/funny AI’, before we realised it was actually real.”
Some PR experts argue that it may have been more planned from Chalamet’s side. “Ultimately Timothée is in the middle of a press tour, and everything that he does is very constructed, even if it may seem organic and ‘random’,” says Sasha Mills, of the communications agency Pacer. She points to the live stream last year of Chalamet dancing wildly to the Black Eyed Peas. “It was designed to seem chaotic, but a team of over 10 people worked on that,” she says. “Given that the director who worked on the live stream, Aidan Zamiri … posted a series of BTS stories around the bike on the day, I would presume that this was a constructed moment designed to amplify the noise around the premiere in a London-specific manner.”
Stage-managed or not, the choice of a Lime was a smart one. The company’s cultural moment has been brewing, catalysed by young male celebrities such as Harry Styles, Paul Mescal, Leo Woodall and Jonathan Bailey choosing its bikes for trips round the capital. Pop stars Mahalia, Lorde and Olivia Rodrigo have also been seen on them.
While Lime bikes are available in Manchester, Milton Keynes, Nottingham and Derby – as well as globally – London seems to have developed a particular soft spot for them. Online, footage of rows of the bikes lined up at the entrance to parks have been likened to “London’s Terracotta Army”.
Lime bikes were namechecked on Charli xcx’s era-defining album, brat, and the incessant sound of stolen bikes has even been called the “click-clack of anti-capitalism”.
At London fashion week in September, one creative duo released a bag inspired by the bike’s front basket. “For some weird reason, Lime has undeniable fashion credentials,” say Tom Snell and Dylan Hartigan, of the creative agency The Or. “The bikes are even accessories in themselves, and the baskets already double as a handbag for your jacket, lipgloss or book of poems. A Jane Birkin [bag] on wheels, perhaps.”
Eloise Gendry-Hearn, of creative communications agency The Digi Fairy, says: “Lime has become a staple for London-dwelling Gen-Zers in the past year, they’ve become a huge key to additional freedom for a cohort that don’t own cars … Lime bikes symbolise freedom, which in a cost of living crisis feels like an accessible luxury.”
Perhaps that explains the loyalty people feel for the bikes. But there are also more practical factors. “It’s becoming increasingly expensive to use TfL transport, and air pollution on the tube is a real problem,” says Mills. “Plus, a lot of areas in London, particularly south London, are still not very well connected.”
There is also the sheer ubiquity of Limes. “There’s just more of them than any other provider in London,” says Mills. Snell and Hartigan add: “They’re like a tank, or an urban horse. Reliable, always there when you need one. A trusty steed ready for your chaotic existence.”
According to Mills, “this is partly due to a deal with a city councillor in Hackney in early 2022 which meant that [Lime] became the e-bike partner for that area. Hackney is known for being a bit of a hotbed of hipster culture, so when some of the people who lived in the area started to use them, it gave the bikes an air of being trendy.”
Dr David Giles, a reader in media psychology at the University of Winchester and co-author of Parasocial Experiences, says Chalamet has made a smart move in a digital age. “For digital culture, authenticity – or, at least, performed authenticity – is fundamental,” he said. “Dumping your Lime bike en route to your premiere is the closest a film star can get to the kind of intimacy on offer with today’s new-style celebs.”
In an era where being approachable is favoured over more old-school and elusive glamour, Lime as chariot – a Gen Z limo, of sorts – fits very nicely, even if relatability ends where the red carpet starts.
