I ordered the Mash 🙃
The last 56 they had.
Everybody I spoke that has a parallax or ac-1 love their bike very much.
Its the most agressive ridebale street bike I found, based on my body measurements.
The custom carbon fork and tubing are a big plus to for me, the downsite is the price offcourse.

The pedal to wheel clearance in a 56 is 7cm, its short but not super extreme. The competition has mostly a cm or 2 more clearance, but some come even shorter. I think its a bit strange your friend falls a lot due to the toe overlap. He must take a lot of extreme turns.

The Liberty street is a great budget option I feel. But it only comes with an alu fork.
I think that's a bit of a shame. But for that money, a realy nice frame.