How Chicano Lowrider Culture Found a Home in Japan

In 1987, Junichi Shimodaira fell in love. He was visiting the United States for the first time when he spotted a car driving low and slow in Southern California. Steadily, Chicano car clubs—an outlet for cultural and political expression that dates back to the 1940s—won Junichi over. At his Paradise Road shop he repairs and restores classic American cars, imbuing the lowrider aesthetic with a Japanese spirit of craftsmanship.