Japan is not just one of the world's largest producers of motorcycles, but it's home to a whole host of the best custom motorcycle workshops on the globe. The chopper scene has simply never stopped growing, resto-mods are big business and just about any style you care to name, there's a company doing incredible things. But cafe racers have never been a big deal in Japan and there are only a handful of workshops that focus on them exclusively. One such operation is Minami Motorcycle, a small outfit based in the beautiful residential area of Meguro, Tokyo. And their bikes come with a twist, they try never to use a single new part on any build, everything is repaired, recycled or taken from anywhere in the automotive world and repurposed to fit. And this is how you end up with this brilliant brat-styled cafe racer, a 1987 BMW R100RS, complete with a vintage car rear wheel.

You would expect then that such an industrial approach to bike building would see Minami Motorcycle operating in one of the manufacturing hearts of Japan, or at least a fast-paced urban setting. But Meguro City is one of the most expensive residential areas in Tokyo, a beautiful setting of museums, open parks and high-end living. And then, down a small side street, bringing recycled custom motorcycles to life is Minami, run by Kenji Heianzan. He opened the business in 2015 and worked on all bikes including Motocross machines, but it wasn't long before he had one very single focus.

Two cylinders. If you look at the vast array of modern-retro motorcycles available from just about any brand, and examine the classic motorcycles that inspired them, it all seems pretty clear. Two cylinders is all you need to create a fun and thrilling machine, it simplifies the styling, provides more than enough power, and there is simply just less to go wrong. And when it comes to classically inspired motorcycles, that balance modern technology with the tried and true parallel twin arrangement, few have ever gotten it better than Kawasaki with their W series of motorcycles. And who better to customise the Japanese bike with British inspiration, than the legend that is Takashi Nihira of Wedge Motorcycle, who has produced this timeless beauty, based on a 1999 Kawasaki W650.

A few years ago, a group of respected motoring journalists grabbed three modern classics from the last twenty years and set out to put them through their paces. All were two-bangers, a Triumph Bonneville, a Moto Guzzi V7 and the Kawasaki W650. And while the stats suggested the Kwaka should be the slowest of the bunch, it held its own with the best of them – has arguably proved the most reliable – and all voting that day gave it the nod in the looks department too. So, it's a shame we don't see more of these brilliant bikes turned into stunning customs, but Nihira-san always knows how to make the wait more than worth it.

Let’s address the elephant in the room: two Green BMW R series motorcycles in as many days. Normally, we wouldn’t commit such a sin, but when both bikes are built by two outstanding companies, it would be pure foolishness on our part to let one simply slip away. And when the legend himself, Kengo Kimura, sent us a fresh batch of photos of his latest masterpiece, we simply had to make it work. There is absolutely no mistaking the distinctive Heiwa Motorcycles style, and from their headquarters on the Hiroshima harbourside, this 1981 BMW R100RS earns its sea legs with the name Salty Green.

We’ve known and loved the work of Kimura-san for years, and every single bike he sends us delivers something new as well as another teaching lesson about mastering this craft. Literally thousands of custom BMW Rs have been built in recent times, but Kimura-san has only tackled a handful. That doesn’t mean, however, that this bike doesn’t feature some very clever tricks, that we expect to see on other builders' bikes in years to come.

Walk into the design area of any modern motorcycle manufacturer and you'll see banks of high-powered computers, allowing the staff to utilise the latest in CAD, Finite Element Analysis, Computational Fluid Dynamics, and a host of other high-tech engineering techniques to develop their latest model. These methods combine with old-school sketches, clay modelling, and the latest in 3D printing and prototyping to create some truly impressive results and amazing designs. So, when we chatted with Kengo Kimura of Heiwa Motorcycles and asked him which design technique he had used over the years, his answer never changed: none of them. The Hiroshima-based hero of the Japanese custom motorcycle scene simply lets the ideas come to life in his mind, and the latest materialization from the master is this super neat and narrow Triumph Bonneville T100.

Kimura-san grew up with a love of motocross, and despite graduating from the Hiroshima University of Economics, he never saw himself wearing a suit to work and crunching numbers behind a desk. So, it was straight to a bike shop for his first full-time job, learning the craft of building bikes and everything that goes into making them fast on the track. In 2005, he decided it was time to go out on his own, and the result has been hundreds of incredible customs, a trophy cabinet overflowing with gold, and a global reputation as one of the best motorcycle builders to have ever walked the earth.

If you praise the custom motorcycle Gods in just the right way, then you will indeed be rewarded for your efforts. No sooner had we published our top ten engine list for a custom bike, than machines with those motors mounted in them started to arrive in our inbox. At number four we had high praise for the modern classic Triumph twin and the undisputable kings of that engine are the team at Tamarit Motorcycles. From across the border in France came a request for a Triumph Bonneville that was equal parts Brat and classic British, and the Spanish shop have nailed the brief with build number 144, appropriately named 'Blanche'.

When it comes time to look for the right custom shop to build your dream bike, it's worth considering what knowledge and skills are possessed by the potential candidate that can help to add that extra something special to your machine. If you live in Europe and own a Triumph, there is immense value in going to a workshop that knows these machines backwards, you avoid any nasty surprises. “No one has created as many motorcycles with the same engine, with over 151 unique motorcycles showcased on our website and around 50 that we haven't showcased. Our core value is the specialization and know-how we have acquired with each project.”

Two things never cease to amaze me about the elite custom bike builders from Japan; the nondescript locations they inhabit and the jaw-droppingly clean bikes they build. Tokyo's Wedge Motorcycle is no different, a small building hidden away, alone on a back road at the edge of a large university. It is here that multi-award winning super talent Takashi Nihira plies his trade and he doesn't need a big workshop to produce truly remarkable one-off machines. No stranger to the Yamaha product, Wedge has focused considerable efforts over the years on the SR400, but a client with a hankering for an even more classically styled ride, saw the need for an extra cylinder. So, Wedge picked out a 1979 Yamaha XS650 and have built an absolutely beautiful bike to serve as a stunning daily ride.

There is an important thing to know about the company behind this motorcycle, the shop used to be called Wedge Paint Factory, but as their reputation for amazing custom bikes grew, a name change to Wedge Motorcycle helped customers find these titans of two wheels. But they still wield the spray gun in anger and with prices for a metallic paint job on your bike's fuel tank starting at just US$300, it shows there really is a place where perfection won't cost you an arm and a leg. The paint shop background also helps to explain the ultra-clean finish, these are the guys in the trade who make everyone else's mess look a million dollars.

The recent Yokohama Hot Rod Custom Show proved once again that there is absolutely no let up in the land of the rising sun, as the country's custom builders continue to turn out one masterpiece after another. From full-blown show bikes to those thrashed for thrills on the race track, the attention to detail is simply incredible. Of course, Kengo Kimura of Hiroshima's Heiwa Motorcycles was in attendance with another one-off custom creation for the ages, but now he's starting 2023 with a bike you could use for your daily commute and sports a feature that is new to the work of the master builder. Enter the Heiwa Triumph Bonneville T100 No. 4, which unlike the other bikes in the series or anything he's built before, sees Kimura-san jump into the world of water cooling.

That's right, for all the hundreds of custom motorcycles that Kengo Kimura has built over the years, this is the first that I'm aware of that features a water-cooled engine. Obviously, I'm sure he's spun the spanners on such a machine, but going through his incredible portfolio, this was the first liquid-cooled motorcycle I could find among them. This is not unusual for many custom builders, especially those who focus on American v-twins, classic British bikes and the clean lines of the many retro-inspired motorcycles that come from Japanese manufacturers.

If there is a totally stock BMW R series motorcycle out there, it must be starting to feel like it’s been left behind, with nearly all of its siblings converted into some form of custom bike or adventure machine. And proudly laying claim to having turned dozens of the German boxers into beautiful bikes is Spain's Cafe Racer Dreams, but they're also willing to adapt and learn, and for their latest build they took a great deal of inspiration from the founder of Brat Style, the one and only Go Takamine. The result is CRD 132, a 1982 BMW R100 that is resplendent in the distinctive aesthetic, while increasing usability, for one go anywhere in style custom machine.

Brat Style is a difficult category of custom to define, as like the founder, everyone has their own take. Generally, they don't seek to make massive changes to the major components of the bike, take on a more industrial/rat rod vibe and incorporate the best of modifications to make for a machine that is truly a blast to ride, rather than being something that's all show and no go. Having built endless R's over many a year, the CRD crew acquired the '82 model and then were down to work in their almost production line like manner.