It’s funny, but sometimes we get so in our own heads about making the most cinematic videos we can and putting all of our gear to work we get so thrown off when we haven’t lined up a car to film a feature on or the weather turns out bad.
I always laugh about the weather one; having grown up in the Pacific North West you would think we’re used to the constant rain by now, especially in the early spring. But for some reason, I always find myself surprised to see it. In this week’s video, we decided to take a simple approach to a rainy day and go run some errands.
We hopped in the JDM RD7 CRV, laughed at the map of Japan still proudly displayed on the navigation system, drank some coffee’s from the car fridge and away we went.
First on the list was visiting Taylor (@tgound) to check out the progress on his manual swapped widebody Toyota Crown sedan as well as drop off a flag for him and install the biggest Checkpoint die-cut we have ever made on his rear window. Paul (@skookum.jzs) who you may remember from our feature on his manual swapped Crown Wagon, was out there helping Taylor sort out his wiring, and Tanner (@tannertaylor) who also rents the space was around to give us the tour and fill us in on his Aristo that is coming back from inspection shortly.
It was inspiring to see their creativity and just how effectively they were able to convert a concrete pad, a pass-through garage and a commercial tent into a backyard shop that not only gives them space to build their cars but keeps the neighbour’s from calling the cops on them every five minutes.
We will definitely be keeping an eye on what these guys are up to this season, especially considering we learned that there are going to be a few more JZX/JZS guys moving into that house soon.
After visiting the Toyota boys we hopped back in the CRV and headed out to Richmond to go check out a few Japanese-inspired stores at one of the popular malls. First up was Super Garage, an RWB themed automotive accessory store filled with some of the most random products you could imagine. The joy of a store like this is how rewarding it is to search for treasure; because after wading through aisles and aisles of random products, we managed to snag a couple of awesome pieces for our incoming Alphard and the CRV as well.
After we headed out from Super Garage we went to Oomomo which is a Japanese marketplace known for delivering “Japanese household essentials” although they are not strictly an automotive business they do have a small car section, the real value here is being able to stock up on all of the best canned coffees, instant noodles and other brilliant Japanese products.
Once we were done terrorizing the mall and clearing the shelves at Super Garage and Oomomo we gave Marcus (@marcuus915) a call to see if he was around for us to check out the new, BN style, kit that he recently installed on his BRZ. He told us he was up by Printing Yes! (@printingyes) so we hopped in the car and headed over.
We were not let down. It was a real pleasure seeing a kit like this on a BRZ unlike all of the replica widebody aero that plagues this chassis, and it further compounded my mentality that the ZN6 generation FRS/BRZ is truly this generation’s 240SX. In typical Marcus fashion, he was in a rush, but that didn’t stop him from making sure to kill at least one corner before he took off.
Before you go, our latest drop of Japanese good goods, new stickers and all of our Checkpoint branded merchandise is available now, take a look at our store using the following link:
https://checkpointjapan.bigcartel.com/category/products
Take a look at the after movie inspired products we released recently as well.
Enjoy.
Checkpoint Japan 