A new book provides a step-by-step guide to help you craft your own ride.

Modern-day, 21st-century technology is undoubtedly great. But, given we use it almost constantly, isn’t it odd that we don’t really understand it? Would you be able to rebuild a shiny, new laptop from its basic components, for example?

It’s satisfying, and rather reassuring, to know that there are other machines that we rely on every day that you could actually get to grips with and build and maintain yourself. Take the bicycle. If you live in one of the world’s modern urban hubs, this throwback to 19th-century engineering is ironically likely to be your most efficient means of getting around. And unlike a modern-day, computer-controlled car, it is a mode of transport that you could put together yourself with your own bare hands (oh, and a set of tools).

That’s where Ms Jenni Gwiazdowski comes in. She’s the founder of the London Bike Kitchen, a fully kitted workshop where you can take classes in bike building and maintenance, get advice from trained mechanics or just drop in and borrow the tools. But if you can’t get to this east London site and want to work at your own pace, Ms Gwiazdowski has poured all of her bicycle knowledge into a new book, How To Build A Bike.

Easy to follow, the book provides step-by-step instructions for constructing a single-speed bike (not before explaining what a single-speed bike is!). From knowing what to look for in a frame to attaching a headset, bottom bracket and chainset – as well as what all those parts are and do – this pictorial guide covers everything you need to know. But more than that, “it’s about breaking down that barrier we have in modern society where nobody really knows how stuff works anymore,” says Ms Gwiazdowski. “Let’s get back to asking questions like why and how does this work? It’s not magic.”

Here Ms Gwiazdowski shares what you can learn about yourself as well as your bike.

By piecing a bike together from raw components, you’re going to get an unrivalled insight into the mechanism behind the finished machine. “When you take something apart, you’re less afraid of what it is,” Ms Gwiazdowski says. “The more you understand how a bike works, the more likely you are to ride it – and the more confident you will feel riding it.”

Obviously, your newfound skills will help when it comes to day-to-day bike maintenance, but you might find that they give you a psychological push beyond. If you can do this, you can do anything, right? “It is a gateway drug,” Ms Gwiazdowski says. “I want people to feel more confident in their everyday life as well as when they’re on their bike.”

“I keep telling people when they start out: shit is going to go wrong,” Ms Gwiazdowski says. “Accept that. You’re probably not going to get it right the first time. Make peace with it and you’re going to be fine.”

In fact, as with most aspects of life, failure can be helpful if properly harnessed: “It’s OK to break stuff because then you learn how to fix it.”

The friends you have might help you find an old racer buried somewhere in a shed, but in bringing this bike back to life, you’re going to meet a whole host of new buddies. A good place to start is your local bike jumble, where you can pick up an old frame and parts. “You’re going to get people who really like their bikes, and they’re not going to sell you something that is probably damaged,” Ms Gwiazdowski says.

It’s also worth getting chummy with the staff and mechanics at your local bike shop – somewhere you can use tools such as a headset press or head cup remover (“You use it so very little I wouldn’t invest in a tool like that,” Ms Gwiazdowski says).

There are even DIY ways of building a bike without these tools, and there’s a whole community online that can help you with that.

By building your own bike, you’re in control of everything from the geometry of the frame – which can dictate whether your bike is built for speed, comfort or somewhere in between – down to each individual component you use. If you’re flexible in terms of budget and the parts you want, and you can pick it up quickly, you could have a bike in no time. “If you laid everything out in front of me I could build a bike in four hours,” Ms Gwiazdowski says.

If you have something really particular in mind, it could take time. “Because they’re looking for specific parts, or they want to make it period specific, some people take years building stuff up,” Ms Gwiazdowski says.

How To Build A Bike: A Simple Guide To Making Your Own Ride (Frances Lincoln) by Ms Jenni Gwiazdowski is out now

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