Electric bikes are typically made from aluminum or (if you’re willing to pay a premium) carbon fiber - lightweight materials that are corrosion resistant, lightweight, and easy to work with. However, they’re not the only options, and wood is a surprisingly practical alternative.
COCO-MATBIKE.UK is a Greek company founded in Athens that’s aiming to prove that lithium and timber are a winning combination. It’s not just a proof of concept, either - COCO-MAT currently makes six bikes (Odysseus, Penelope, Telemachus, Mentor, Telegonus, and Argos), with various gearing options and two electric models.
The bikes are certainly striking – the entire frame is made from pale wood, from the handlebars to the fenders – and they could soon be rolling through a street near you. TechRadar spoke to Dimitri Philippou, CEO of ARTC GLOBAL, which is bringing the bikes to the UK, to find out why your daily rider should be made from timber.
Branching out
If you’re thinking ‘COCO-MAT’ sounds like an unusual name for a bike builder, you’re right. The company, which was founded by brothers, Paul and Mike Evmorfidis in 1989, mainly focuses on sustainable furniture, bed linen, and mattresses.
“Paul is a little on the crazy side,” says Philippou. “He’s the one who’s big on the environment – In fact, he’s on the Amazon on a river ride now.
"A few years ago, he was riding in the Alps, his bike broke down, and he decided ‘I’m going to make a wooden bike'. That’s where it came from.”
The first wooden bikes were built about six years ago. At first they were used as a marketing tool, but they proved surprisingly practical and people were so interested that the brothers decided to turn them into a proper business. They began selling wooden bicycles soon after, and three years ago branched out into e-bikes as well.
The bike frames are made of American ash from forests that are dedicated to growing trees for lumber. “It’s very environmentally focused and very durable,” Philippou says. “From each tree we can make 50 bikes, and our commitment is that we plant a tree for every adult bike we sell, so it’s a net positive.”
The frames are cut by machine, then sanded and assembled by hand – a manufacturing process that releases much less carbon than traditional bike building.
Grit, wind and fire
Philippou says that riding the two-speed and seven-speed models feels just like a regular bike. They aren’t meant for off-road use, but they can handle gravel, and the springiness of the wood provides a little natural shock absorption.
Still, the climate in Athens is very different to northern Europe – how can a wooden bike handle the notoriously wet UK climate? “The wooden bikes are treated to repel water,” he explains.
“In fact, the frames that originally had a three-year warranty are now going to have a lifetime guarantee. In the process of time we’ve seen how durable the bikes are, and now we feel confident.” The non-wooden components, including the gearing, has a one-year warranty, and the warranty for the battery is two years.
The company assures riders that wooden e-bikes need no more TLC than conventional ones (check out our complete guide to e-bike maintenance for details).
“Their minimal design and operation leaves almost no space for things that can go wrong,” says Philippou. “Drum brakes and automatic gears ensure almost a lifetime operation without maintenance. If anything fails in the course of the years though, our expert cycle repair shops partners in the United Kingdom will do the job.”
The use of wood raises a question about flammability, though. TechRadar recently spoke to the Fire Protection Research Foundation about best practice for avoiding e-bike fires, but does a timber frame pose an additional risk?
“The frames, of course, are treated for fire so there’s no problem there and there is short circuit and thermal protection through the battery pack's management system,” Philippou explains.
In accordance with EU laws, the motor only kicks in while the rider is pedaling. The current battery has a range of 40-50km, much like a conventional mid-range e-bike, but the company is currently working on a new model that will keep rolling for up to 100km on a single charge. It’s also investigating the possibility of using Tesla batteries in future bikes.
What's next
The UK business will begin online at first, with the official launch happening around March 18 to tie in with Ride to Work Week. Later on, COCO-MAT hopes to open several stores in cities like Oxford, Cambridge, and London where riders will be able to buy and rent the bikes.
“You can have cycle tours, and that will be exciting,” Philippou says. “In addition to all the beautiful sightseeing locations around the UK, you get to experience it on an iconic, sustainable bike. The excitement is to see the bikes on the streets.”
Could Webb help us spot interstellar visitors like ‘Oumuamua'? NASA thinks so
In 2017, we spotted, for the first time, an interstellar object passing through our solar system. It was the cigar-shaped 'Oumuamua. To this day, we still don't know what it was or even precisely what it actually looked like, but NASA hopes that the new James Webb Space Telescope will give us a better look the next time around.
"So far, astronomers have confirmed only two of these interlopers from other star systems – 1I/'Oumuamua in 2017 and 2I/Borisov in 2018 – but many, many more are thought to exist," Ann Jenkins and Christine Pulliam, of the Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, wrote in a NASA blog post this week . "Scientists have had only limited ability to study these objects once discovered, but all of that is about to change with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope."
The sensitivity of Webb's instruments as well as its prime location a million miles away from the Earth's atmosphere and its interference gives Webb one of the clearest views of the universe possible. This should greatly enhance our ability to home in on transient objects and get a lot more data about them before they pass out of view of astronomers.
"The supreme sensitivity and power of Webb now present us with an unprecedented opportunity to investigate the chemical composition of these interstellar objects and find out so much more about their nature: where they come from, how they were made, and what they can tell us about the conditions present in their home systems," said Martin Cordiner, an astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and The Catholic University of America, as well as the principal investigator for the Webb Target of Opportunity program .
"The ability to study one of these and find out its composition – to really see material from around another planetary system close up – is truly an amazing thing," Cordiner added.
When such a target of opportunity will appear can't be predicted, but there is a lot of material out there in the interstellar medium and space is a big place, so there's no telling how many interstellar visitors we actually get each year.
With Webb though, we should at least be ready for the next time one rolls through our backyard.
Analysis: Webb isn't even ready yet and we're already finding new things for it to do
The James Webb Space Telescope is still undergoing its mirror alignment process , so we won't even get the first real images from it for another month or two at least, but already we're finding new ways we can use it once it's ready.
Webb's first year of operations, known as Cycle 1 , are already parceled out to various projects, like examining the TRAPPIST-1 system to look for an Earth 2.0 and looking for the first stars and galaxies to have formed in the universe.
But Webb can do so much more, and astronomers are eager to put its sensitive instruments to use in new and exciting ways, including some we never planned.
"With Webb, we can do really interesting science at much fainter magnitudes or brightnesses," said Cristina Thomas, assistant professor of astronomy at Northern Arizona University. "Also, we've never been able to observe interstellar objects in this region of the infrared [spectrum]. It opens a lot of opportunities for the different compositional signatures that we're interested in. That's going to be a huge boon for us!"
House of the Dragon: release date, trailer cast and everything we know so far
It's been almost three years since the Game of Thrones finale saw HBO's flagship show bow out with a whimper rather than a bang, but the world of Westeros is finally coming back in 2022.
House of the Dragon, a 10-episode series based on George R. R. Martin’s 2018 novel, Fire and Blood, will tell the backstory of the Targaryen dynasty, taking place 200 years prior to the events of the original show.
Below, we've detailed everything we know about the show so far – from its confirmed release date to main cast of characters.
Release date: The highly-anticipated series is confirmed to land on August 21, 2022 on HBO Max in the US, plus August 22, 2022 on Sky Atlantic in the UK.
Cast: Matt Smith, Olivia Cooke, Paddy Considine, Rhys Ifans, Emma D'Arcy, Sonoya Mizuno and Steve Toussaint are all set to feature in the series as part of its vast ensemble cast. Scroll down for much more on who they're each playing, as well as the other confirmed cast members.
Story: Not much has been revealed about the show's plot yet, but being set around 200 years before Game of Thrones, we'd expect Targaryen infighting to form a big part of House of the Dragon's story. And yes: there will be dragons.
House of the Dragon will launch on Sunday, August 21 on HBO Max in the US, plus other international territories where WarnerMedia's streaming platform is available. UK viewers will be able to access episodes at the same time as their US counterparts (on the morning of August 22 ) on Sky Atlantic and Now TV.
Executive producer George R. R. Martin confirmed, in February, that filming had wrapped on "all ten episodes," before HBO finally revealed the show's official release date March.
As mentioned, in addition to launching on HBO and HBO Max in the US, the series has been confirmed for release on Sky and Now TV in the UK, following a new deal Sky TV signed with HBO in October 2019 that will keep HBO shows on the platforms "for many years to come."
By the time House of the Dragon's 2022 release date does roll around, HBO Max will likely have also found its way to several European regions , too, so the show will be available to watch, one way or another, in more places than ever.
At a glance, the key House of the Dragon cast looks like this:
HBO has been pretty open about who's in House of the Dragon's cast (and who's playing which characters) ever since filming on the show began last year.
Still, we're going to be careful on spoilers, here, because if you go digging into the events of Fire and Blood, you might end up ruining part of the show's story. Below, we're sticking to what HBO has officially revealed so far about House of the Dragon.
First up, Paddy Considine is playing King Viserys Targaryen, who's selected by the lords of Westeros as the successor to the previous king – Jaehaerys Targaryen. HBO describes him as a 'warm, kind and decent man', whose main goal is to continue his grandfather's way of doing things. But since when does being a 'decent man' ever get you anywhere in Westeros, except dead? Viserys is also the namesake of Daenerys' older brother.
Let's go to the highest-profile piece of casting in the show. Playing Viserys' younger brother, Prince Daemon Targaryen, is Matt Smith of The Crown and Doctor Who fame. Described as an unmatched warrior, he's the heir to the throne of Westeros – he's also capable of riding dragons, and he sounds like trouble waiting to happen. Not everyone in Westeros seems to be a fan of Daemon, as we'll touch on below.
Let's flip to another Targaryen. Truth Seekers’ Emma D'Arcy plays Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen, Viserys' first-born child – it sounds like her only big drawback in this show is being a woman, when the world around her favors men in positions of power. But hey, she's also capable of riding dragons, and she's of pure Valyrian blood. Milly Alcock will play a younger version of Princess Rhaenyra.
Ready Player One’s Olivia Cooke plays Alicent Hightower. She's politically savvy, and is closely aligned with the king and his allies – she's also the daughter of Rhys Ifans ' Otto Hightower, the Hand of the King. Hightower doesn't trust Daemon, and regards his status as heir to the throne as a fraught state of affairs. The younger version of Alicent will be played by Emily Carey .
Steve Toussaint plays Lord Corlys Velaryon, also known as the Sea Snake. He's got big nautical energy, possessing the largest navy in Westeros and being a famous adventurer on the high seas himself. The Velaryon bloodline is as old as House Targaryen, HBO says. Interestingly, in March 2021, it was reported by Deadline that HBO was considering a spin-off focusing specifically on this character.
Eve Best plays Corlys' wife, Princess Rhaenys Velaryon. She was in contention to rule Westeros, except the Great Council bypassed her status as heir to elect her cousin, Viserys, as king. The reason? He's a man, and she is not. That's bound to be the source of some major tension on the show.
Sticking with relatives to Corlys, Wil Johnson plays his younger brother, Ser Vaemond Velaryon, who is also a commander in the Velaryon navy. Savannah Steyn stars as Lady Laena Velayron, daughter of Corlys and Rhaenys, while both John Macmillan and Theo Nate play their son, Ser Laenor Velaryon (older and younger, respectively).
Other characters include Devs' Sonoya Mizuno as Mysaria, who HBO says has been "sold more times than she can recall". She's escaped a life of degradation, however, and now finds herself as the closest ally of Prince Daemon Targaryen, making her a fairly powerful figure in Westeros.
Dornish lad Ser Criston Cole is being played by Fabien Frankel . He's a commoner, but since HBO notes he kicks ass with a sword, you can expect him to play a key role in the larger story of House of the Dragon.
Then there's The Hobbit actor Graham McTavish , who'll be playing Ser Harrold Westerling, a paragon of chivalry and honor who has served in the Kingsguard since the days of King Jaehaerys. Incidentally, McTavish also starred in The Witcher season 2 , so the actor is clearly in an epic fantasy place right now.
Other cast members (and characters) include Ryan Corr (as Ser Harwin ‘Breakbones’ Strong), Jefferson Hall (as twins Lord Jason Lannister and Tyland Lannister), David Horovitch (as Grand Maester Mellos), Matthew Needham (as Larys Strong), Bill Paterson (as Lord Lyman Beesbury) and Gavin Spokes (as Lord Lyonel Strong).
You'll find character notes on all of the above on HBO's official show page .
The new Game of Thrones prequel series focuses on House Targaryen, so expect ambition, incest and, of course, winged, fire-breathing reptiles. George R. R. Martin confirmed the latter on his blog , admitting, "I can say there will be dragons. Everyone else has said that, so why not me?"
As mentioned, the new show is based on Martin's 2018 book Fire and Blood, which managed to annoy a section of the fanbase by not being The Winds of Winter, the long-awaited sixth novel in the A Song of Ice and Fire saga – it's been 10 years since the previous instalment, A Dance With Dragons, landed in bookstores.
Instead, the book is a history of the dragon-riding Targaryen family – the author himself has described it as the "GRRMarillion", a nod to the dense J. R. R. Tolkien non-novel that recounts the pre-Lord of the Rings history of Middle-earth.
In terms of chronology, House of the Dragon will be set 200 years before Game of Thrones. The series promises to tell the story of House Targaryen – but nothing else has been shared about the plot, other than what we've learned in the character descriptions above.
We've had our first trailer, which you'll find below, wherein an ominous Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) utters the cryptic lines, “Gods. Kings. Fire. Blood. Dreams didn’t make us kings. Dragons did” – though that doesn't give too much away as regards the show's story.
Still, we can speculate. There's likely to be plenty of familial in-fighting – the Targaryens were dysfunctional long before Viserys and Daenerys came along – alongside the origin stories of other major Westerosi houses like the Baratheons, Tyrells and Lannisters.
In other words, House of the Dragon looks set to have the same mix of epic battles, political intrigue and betrayals as Game of Thrones, with one major difference – this being a prequel, we know exactly where it's heading.
A Twitter announcement in October 2019 revealed that George R. R. Martin created the new Game of Thrones prequel series with Ryan Condal. Condal is best known for showrunning USA Network alien invasion drama Colony, and scripting the Dwayne Johnson-starring game adaptation Rampage.
Condal has written the show and will share showrunning duties with Miguel Sapochnik. Sapochnik directed some of Game of Thrones' most epic episodes – including season 6's Battle of the Bastards and season 8's The Long Night – and will helm multiple episodes of House of the Dragon, including the pilot.
Other confirmed producers include Vince Gerardis, Sara Lee Hess and Ron Schmidt. Directors Clare Kilner, Geeta V Patel and Greg Yaitanes are also working on the series.
What's more, Variety reports that House of the Dragon will be the first show to make use of the V stage, a new virtual production stage at Warner Bros. Studios in Leavesden, UK – which we presume could be similar to the Mandalorian's MicroLED display stages .
And, in perhaps the best appointment of all, composer Ramin Djawadi will be returning from Game of Thrones to score House of the Dragon.
A new trailer for House Of The Dragon arrived at the start of May , and you can see it below:
We got our first official look at House of the Dragon via the show's debut teaser trailer, which dropped in October. You can watch it below.
What happened to the Game of Thrones prequel series, Blood Moon?
The other prequel series looked set to be massive. One of five potential spin-off shows ordered into development by HBO, this one, set 8,000 years before the events of Game of Thrones, looked the most likely to get a green light. HBO even shot a pilot episode over the summer of 2019.
Scripted by Jane Goldman – who boasts Kick-Ass, X-Men: First Class and Kingsman on her impressive resumé – the untitled series would reportedly have told the story of the First Men, the Children of the Forest, and the creation of the White Walkers.
Naomi Watts headed up an impressive cast that also included John Simm (Life on Mars, Doctor Who), Miranda Richardson (Blackadder II, Good Omens), Jamie Campbell Bower (The Twilight Saga: New Moon, King Arthur) and Naomi Ackie (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, The End of the F***ing World).
All looked promising until October 2019, when it turned out HBO had decided not to pick up the show. So, what gave the broadcaster the fear?
"In development, in pilots, sometimes things come together, sometimes they don't," HBO President of Programming Casey Bloys told Deadline . "One of the things I think Jane [Goldman] took on beautifully, which was a challenge, there was a lot more world creation because she set hers 8,000 years before the [parent] show, so it required a lot more. One of the things about House of Dragons [sic], there is a text, there is a book, so that made it a little bit more of a road map for a series order.
"I think Jane did a beautiful job, it was a big challenge but there was nothing that I would point to and say, 'Oh, that one element did not work.' Just overall it did not quite gel."
As for whether House of the Dragon will eventually be joined on HBO by more shows set in Westeros, Bloys simply said: "For me for right now, I think getting House of the Dragon on the air will be the number one priority. There are no other blinking green lights or anything like that. Sometime down the road who knows, but there are no immediate plans."
In February 2021, Bloys again weighed in on the franchise's future beyond House of the Dragon. "I've never wanted to do this with a mandate that you must have three series by this time or you must exploit adult animation or you must do that,” he told Deadline .
"It’s really coming from: would that be interesting? Is that good? Do we have a writer we believe in? That’s kind of the approach we are taking. I think you have to because if you don’t do that, it would lead to putting shows on for the sake of it."
This remained the situation in June 2021. “Any script that is in development or pitched becomes news, and it inevitably gets reported and people assume they are in production,” Bhoys told Deadline . “Only House of the Dragon is in production, the rest are in development, and we will make a decision.”
While HBO is staying tight-lipped on the matter, other Westeros-set shows reportedly in development include 9 Voyages (focused on House of the Dragon character Lord Corlys Velaryon) and The Tales of Dunk and Egg (about the early days of King Aegon Targaryen).
The Hollywood Reporter also reports that several animated spin-offs are in development, though it also claims Flea Bottom (a potential live-action series set in the slums of Kings Landing) has been abandoned. For now, however, House of the Dragon is the only Game of Thrones spin-off you need to worry about.
Should you care about House of the Dragon?
By the time House of the Dragon arrives, we think curiosity for a Game of Thrones prequel series will be higher than it would've been three years ago, when the show ended divisively.
The big names in the cast and shift in time frame do make the series sound intriguing – the pressure will just be on to make the stakes feel as grand as they were in the main series, which is tough when we ultimately know what happens to House Targaryen.
Still, we have missed seeing CG dragons destroy stuff over the past couple of years. If nothing else, hopefully this series will have plenty of that, and in any case, George R. R. Martin has said he "loved" the rough cuts of the House of the Dragon episodes he's seen so far – so it at least sounds like Game of Thrones fans are in for a treat.