On the first weekend of December each year, the Pacifico Yokohama convention center is filled to the brim with highly imaginative machines for the Yokohama Hot Rod Custom Show. There’s a whole lot going on—from crazy engineering to retina-searing paint jobs. But one Japanese custom builder stands out for entirely different reasons. Shiro Nakajima, otherwise…
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When Shiro Nakajima isn’t honing his considerable talents in his home workshop at the base of the Yatsugatake Mountains, you’ll find him racing at the Tsukuba Circuit, a few hours away. Those opposing environments are reflected in Nakajima-san’s custom bikes; tasteful restomods that are aesthetically restrained, but also built to be ridden hard. The man…
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Mentioning ‘Triumph’ and ‘Steve McQueen’ together conjures up images of the iconic desert sleds that the King of Cool kicked up Californian dust with. This custom Triumph T140 Bonneville takes inspiration from one of McQueen’s most famous bikes—his number 955 TR6 desert racer. But it’s been built for a very different purpose. The 1976-model T140…
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There’s something special about Shiro Nakajima’s work, and it’s painted all over the elegant lines of this custom KTM 690 Duke. Nakajima-san’s creations show a clear affinity to vintage race bikes but look like they’d be more at home on twisty B-roads. They are brutally mechanical yet graceful; retro and modern at the same time.…
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This week’s list starts with the first custom Honda Gyro X we’ve ever featured, courtesy of Deus ex Machina’s Japanese outpost. We…
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In the rarified world of artisan bike builders, Shiro Nakajima stands apart. His bikes are usually functional, and sometimes even practical: the…
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The phrase ‘renaissance man’ is thrown around too loosely these days, along with ‘legendary’ and ‘iconic.’ But there’s no other way to…
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The incomparable Yokohama Hot Rod Custom Show went down this past weekend, and as usual the brightest stars of the Japanese custom…
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It’s around this time of year that all the top Japanese builders release their latest customs. Many workshops have spent weeks burning…
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The BMW R1150GS is almost twenty years old, and a future candidate for classic status. And although BMW owners are famously fastidious…
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On the surface, building a custom and building a race bike are pretty similar endeavors. And there are quite a few builders…
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We’ve been fans of Shiro Nakajima’s work since Bike EXIF kicked off eight years ago. From classic restorations to full-on race bikes,…
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