If there's any one general theme running through all of Roland Sands' custom builds, it's this: No part goes untouched. It's a total design aesthetic stretched across multiple platforms, fusing multiple styles, borrowing from multiple sources.

They're pure form and function with nary a gratuitous spike or arbitrary ornament. Admittedly, Sands adds a certain amount of flair, but he tries to make sure it's flair for a reason.

What he and Roland Sands Design have done is carve out a unique spot in the custom industry where genres overlap and the whole thing is shot through with a punk vibe flavored by hot rods and road-race bikes. In the process he's tapped into something that screams of youth, not intentionally whacking at some marketer's demographic, but nailing a young-blooded buzz that feels entirely authentic.

"I didn't come into this industry going, 'Shit, I need to make shit for young people,' you know, but I'm a young person. It's very hard for someone to market to 'the youth' if they're not of and from 'the youth' and they're not in touch with it," says Sands, a very young-looking 33. "I guess because myself, I'm a surfer, a skateboarder, and I've always ridden dirtbikes and motocross bikes. I've lived that quote/unquote extreme lifestyle. I don't even like to use that word because I think it's cheesy.

The RSD offices, where style met performance and produced its bastard offspring. Sands and crew have never met a motor they didn't like or want to make better. Parts ain't just parts.

"For me it's just constantly doing new and different things and improving things, like looking at influences that are around me and inserting them into my designs. I think that's just a youthful way of looking at things. Rather than looking inside the industry for my influences, I try to draw from everything around me."

What's tough is taking all those influences, especially the intangibles, and distilling them into a design that looks right, feels right and performs better. Says Sands, "What I want to be able to do as a bike designer is touch every part of a bike."

While he's not the first bike builder to dwell in the esoteric world of design, Sands is the one who's managed to meld sportbike features and performance with American V-twin brute, and vice versa. RSD sits at the crossroads of two distinct custom bike markets, a crossover that might not have been obvious a few years ago.

"It's really about versatility. I'm looking at all different bikes and how to combine things. I like taking something from each genre of motorcycle and put it into one," Sands explains. "For me, I still want to build the baddest of every type of motorcycle that I can think of. I feel like I haven't done it all, not even close yet."

But how do you turn a personal aesthetic into something that's going to be mass-produced like a motorcycle part? Better yet, what nerve is it that RSD has touched with bikes like the KR V-5 Tracker, Glory Stomper, El Borracho, and The Hardway, or with the parts he's designed for Performance Machine?

"Sometimes a new design is uncomfortable. Like the Victory [Vision]. It's uncomfortable. People haven't seen it before. It takes them a minute to get used to it, but that doesn't always mean it's bad. It just means it's different. Things that are different, they shake people up. They change the way people look at things," he says.