Baltimore cyclist finds joy in collecting lost hubcaps and turning them into works of art
BALTIMORE– Cyclist Barnaby Wickham has collected more than 700 lost hubcaps, mostly on bike rides around Baltimore. They inspired a quest to turn trash into art, including Christmas wreaths, a giant fish and a big Snoopy head.
It’s a hobby that developed almost two years ago thanks to his love of cycling and the joy of making something with the waste he collected.
“I think it’s kind of the excitement of the hunt, on the one hand,” Wickham said. “I love riding bikes. I love Baltimore. I love going out in Baltimore, and there are just enough hubcaps and things like car grilles to be interesting, but not so much that it’s too easy.”
Wickham, 54, says he can’t really explain it, but one day while riding his bike in early 2024, he decided to bring home a lost hubcap. Since then, he has started putting on the hubcaps he sees on his backpack.
“I monitor them and I have a Google map,” he said. “I pin the places where I find each one.”
Other members of his community who are interested in his projects let him know when they see hubcaps on the side of the road. Today, Wickham keeps a list of them that he calls “hubcaps in the wild.”
He wants to collect it himself. That’s part of the joy.
Wickham also gets help from his wife, Kate, who helps hold materials during construction and provides feedback.
“I’m just a supportive, and sometimes the cautious person who says, you can’t drive on this road, you can’t ride a bike on this road or whatever. So I’m just more supportive of his love of trying new things,” she said.
It may seem like a strange hobby, but Baltimore is known for celebrating its quirky side. The city is known for director John Waters, whose offbeat films earned him the nickname “The Pope of Trash.” Baltimore is also home to the American Visionary Art Museum, nationally recognized as a repository of works by self-taught artists and intuitive art.
Wickham, who works in marketing for a defense technology company, stores his finds in his garage and works in his yard. It uses expanded metal as a frame, with sheets drilled with holes and wiring to hold the sheets in place. It uses fasteners to connect the hubcaps to the sheet metal.
“Everything is held together by ties,” he said. “Hubcaps are filled with slots or holes, so it’s easy to grab them to hold them in place.”
His works are great. Snoopy’s head is 4.9 meters tall and approximately 6.4 meters wide.
While most of the hubcaps he uses were found in Baltimore, Wickham expanded his line during his travels. Visits to see his son at Kent State University added some hubcaps from Ohio. A business trip to Italy, which included a bike tour in Rome, led to a discovery. Wickham had to explain to his guide why he had bothered to collect it.
“And I was like, oh, I collect them. I’m just going to take this back with me. And I showed her a picture of the crown, and she was like, ‘Oh, OK.’ Every time someone hears about it and understands it, they’re on board,” Wickham said.
Wickham donated two Christmas wreaths he made last year, one to the city and another to a nonprofit organization.
Wickham said the hobby has led to interactions with city residents. During one trip, a man who saw him picking up a hubcap beckoned him insistently to come closer to him. He wanted to let her know there was another hubcap nearby.
“It was clear to him that I was collecting these items, and all he wanted to do was help me, point me out to one. And there are a lot of them,” Wickham said.
“It sparks a lot of conversations, and it’s just something people like to talk about,” he said.
