There are pockets of the U.S. that seem to generate a gravity specific to certain crafts. The California Bay Area has produced frame builders to a degree found nowhere else in the United States. Alberti Eisentraut, Bruce Gordon and Rock Lobster’s Paul Sadoff all built their careers in the Bay Area. Santa Cruz has contributed more artisans to the craft than any other community in the Bay Area. Frame Builder John Caletti hails from Santa Cruz and had the fortune to learn from many of the area’s craftsmen before striking out on his own with Caletti Cycles in 2004.
As a one-man shop, anyone who orders from John deals with the man himself. Caletti offers a wide range of models including road, gravel and mountain, with some grayer areas thrown in. He works in both steel and titanium, but he’s best known for his titanium work.
Caletti is an affable guy who’s easy to talk to and supportive of other builders, so much so that he offers a Frame Builder’s Summit in which he imparts his more than two decades of experience to newer builders working to make that transition to building full-time.
Any time I visit Santa Cruz, I never fail to see a Caletti on the road.
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