Portland’s Unique ‘One Moto Show’ Is Everyone’s Motorcycle Show

In Portland, it’s known as “The One Show,” the annual gathering of local (and now international) riding and motorcycle enthusiasts who come to soak in a bit of that Portland Weird and admire the handiwork of builders and riders who have assembled their dream bike, no matter what that dream may be.

This author attended the first One Motorcycle Show (the official name of the show) back when it was essentially a lark, a sort of one-off idea by Thor Drake (actual name, left), a mustachioed local rider, talented visual designer and bike customizer who had worked at Nike and some big local ad agencies before opening a motorcycle-themed coffee shop called See See Motor Coffee (the name and logo are both a literal and multi-level visual pun on the “cc” of motorcycle displacement). The shop, located on a busy Portland inner-city thoroughfare, quickly became a nexus of the thriving local motorcycle and scooter scenes.

Thor’s impetus for the One Moto Show (as it is also known) was that in his opinion, motorcycle “shows” had become a bit too exclusive for their own good and were filled with bikes regular riders could not really relate to. Also, the name of the “One Show” is a riff on a philosophical proposition: If you could have or create “one thing” (a motorcycle in this case) that fulfilled your passion, what would it be? The mechanical answer is likely good enough to be in the One Show. As such, the One Motorcycle Show is perhaps the most eclectic mix of machines and riders you’ll encounter in one place. There are bikes that would fit in well at The Quail concours, but most are imperfect or very inventive labors of love that get regularly ridden with joy by their owners and creators.

After starting in an empty industrial district warehouse on a cold February day in the ‘aughts (above), the One Motorcycle Show has grown and moved around over the years until it recently landed in a massive roofed but otherwise open-air boat-building industrial cathedral at the Zidell shipyards (below), a once-busy industrial center below a narrow bridge across the Willamette River. It’s quite the spot: both open-air and covered, covid-proof as well as weatherproof. After a wet and cold spring, the sun finally came out for the One Show, allowing Drake to emcee numerous high-flying stunt and motorcycle drill team exhibitions over the three days of the show. With the One Show’s growth and growing reputation has come sponsorship from heavyweights like Indian Motorcycle, Progressive Insurance, Portland-based multitool maker Leatherman, helmet maker Bell and many others.

The venue is now ringed by recently contsructed towering skyscrapers filled with spendy condos and a busy medical plaza that links to Oregon’s version of the Mayo Clinic, the massive Oregon Health and Science University complex. A vertigo-inducing but also sci-fi windowed tram that has become a tourist attraction ferries OHSU staffers and patients on a brief aerial adventure to the medical complex’s sprawling hillside campus, known locally as Pill Hill.

And there’s more than just motorcycles. Drake’s moto passions extend to automobiles as well, so this year saw the inclusion of such vehicles as a Cadillac hearse that’s been lifted and lit for the apocalypse (above), a vintage ‘Vette with a very fuzzy interior (in the photo gallery below), some slammed and cambered drift cars, and an Imaginarium RV straight out of a Wes Anderson movie.

Stunt riding shows, a helmet design contest (the weirder the better), and a bevy of Portland’s renowned food carts fill out the grounds. Craft beers on tap? Check. Loud and live rock and roll? Check. Zenith people watching? Check. Drake told Forbes.com that he had once set a 10-year limit on putting on the One Show. Fourteen years later, plans are already in place for next year.

Scroll down for more photos and fun from the One Motorcycle Show. Use CMD + on your keyboard to enlarge the images.