6.6 weeks x

渋谷東京日本 x

Rolling through the middle of Shibuya with Hiroyuki-San and his PS13 from Team FREEE’S ☆ x

ひろゆきさん ＰＳ１３ でんでん すたいる – ちーむ ＦＲＥＥＥ’Ｓ☆. Hiroyuki Sans PS13 from Team FREEE’S☆. This photo was taken just around the block from the main crossing in Shibuya. Was an awesome sight to see a low, loud and shiny drift car in the dead centre of Tokyo. From here we drove way outside of the city and met up with the rest of the team. I took a bunch of photos this night so I will be slowly dropping them over time! x

During the week I would try and venture out as much as possible. When I wasn’t shooting cars I was capturing other side of Japan. On a few occasions I met up with a friend called Ben who is from England, living in Tokyo. Chilling out around Shibuya during peak hour was definitely something to take in. Soon after, we rode about 15 minutes to a place called Shimokitazawa. This particular area in Tokyo is by far a personal favourite. Boasting its second hand thrifted stores and mouth watering yakitori bars it was the perfect spot to spend a Spring afternoon. After a few drinks and a couple of sake’s we made our way down the one way streets to a Shisha Bar ran by Taiga-San, cool name huh? This place was so relaxing, apart from the fact your head would start spinning after a few minutes. He serves drinks along with a ¥800 shisha with a countless number of different smoke from his tiny water pipes with flavours to choose from. Without a doubt will be back to see Taiga-San when I’m back in Tokyo x

Since returning home from Japan I have been posting daily updates on what I captured in the seven weeks I spent overseas. Since then I haven’t really spoken about what I really did on the trip, it has just been non-stop random posts from my archives. I feel as if I need to get more of a point across to you, as readers of Shirtstuckedin so here is my attempt to do so. The main idea of this site is somewhere that I can publish all that I’ve captured during my travels to Japan from my home, Australia. I want to show each and every single one of you how amazing and versatile the Japanese car culture really is, after all the majority of styles, trends and cars come from this archipelago. Since my first trip in 2010 I have been completely blown away in how the Japanese people create what they do. In saying that I don’t want to force you to be a fan of some of the styles or trends that is evolving in Japan. I don’t want to force you to like everything that gets posted, but to respect what these incredible people strive to create. Whether it be a Hellflush inspired style EG Civic with sticker bombed guards or a 600hp drift car, 110% will go into it and that is what you learn to respect. With the internet and social medias booming like no other it’s really sad to see the amount of hate being thrusted upon styles. As quoted by Charles Kha “We should remember that we all share the same underlying love of cars.”

Getting back on track, my most recent trip was by far the best I’ve experienced. Traveling to Japan for a few weeks is nothing short of a life changing experience. Just under 2 months transformed me for a number of good reasons. In that time I not only spent countless hours shooting and meeting some of the coolest cars and people I’ve yet to come across, but gave me a better understanding on how things flow. I have to hand it to all the foreigners who live in Japan, it wouldn’t be an easy country to get settled into so I have immense amount of respect for those who are making it work. What I have also learnt is to do what you really want to do. All through high school all I wanted to do was to travel to Japan and take photos of cars that I have drooled about for so many years. I’m not saying that I have reached my goals or got to a stage in life where I’m content, actually far from it. I’m saying if you want to do something like travel to Japan, do it. The world is at our fingertips, you probably hear this everyday, but seriously it is. Yeah, it might cost a few thousand dollars but we live once, if you’re into cars and an amazing culture such as Japan, which I know all of you who are reading this are then I urge you to do it. It will change you for good, freshen your mind and make you appreciate every individual style people aim to create which is what I’d love to see my audience do. It is one thing to create a blog, or a Facebook page these days and post photos that others have captured over the past 3 decades in Japan. Not saying that is necessarily a bad thing but it is sad to see how much time is being wasted looking, reposting rather than doing. Like I stated above and you all know, we live once, so live and experience it! Traveling and exploring a culture such as Japan will really make you appreciate.

During my last week in Japan I decided to walk around a few areas, more specifically Shinjuku and Shibuya. There were a few afternoons where I would go to the main crossing and just take it all in. Above is a photo I captured on a gorgeous spring afternoon during peak hour. As clichéd as this area is to photograph it is seriously breathtaking so I had to post it. Don’t go anywhere because I have hardly scratched the surface on the content from my previous trip. The updates will continue as always. I hope you have a better understanding on how I’m trying to direct each of you individually. Thanks for your support as always, Casey. If you’re wanting to explore previous Japanese photo galleries on Shirtstuckedin, you can simply click 2011 or 2010 and browse freely. Enjoy x

Japan 2010

Japan 2011

When you think of Japan you probably think of the cars, big cities, vibrant lights and people scattered everywhere. Driving through the city at night it is EXACTLY like that. Leaving Tomei quite late we found ourselves driving around and around Shinjuku, Shibuya and Harajuku looking for accommodation. I snapped this image off whilst strapped into the back seat of our tiny hire car, it was taken in the dead centre of Harajuku, at one of those large intersections, but nothing quite as large as the one in Shibuya.