The S4R has got to be one of Ducati’s greatest hits. The water-cooled Monster used a retuned DOHC 996 engine with eight valves and a stout 113 hp, weighed just 425 pounds (193 kilos) dry, and sported a single-sided swingarm. And it was good for over 145 mph (235 kph). The S4R can still hold its own against many modern roadsters, but it was launched 16 years ago – and tired examples are now popping up on the secondhand scene. Which makes it an ideal base for a custom build, as the Dutch shop Moto Adonis has just discovered.

Shop founder Daan Borsje has delivered a most unusual custom, with radical styling that doesn’t slot into any obvious genre. It’s in-your-face and unapologetic, much like the S4R itself. “My loyal customer and friend Stijn Van Horick came to me with the desire to own a one-off, futuristic cafe racer,” says Daan. “I also had a desire: to build a custom based on one of the most brutal and best steering motorcycles I have ever ridden, the Ducati S4R.”
“We started with a wish list as big as a Harry Potter book, and narrowed it down?still a way too long list of stuff we wanted on the bike.”

Stijn recalls the brief: “It needed to be brutal, slick, and with a nice ‘flow.’ A unique bike. I’ve always liked Ducati, and it was cool that Daan had the same idea. It was the first Ducati that Moto Adonis would build.”

In the Roosendaal works...