In this video, we take a pre-Covid trip to Japan to learn why one young tailor is so much in demand, there is a six- to nine-month waiting list for his bespoke suits.

Noriyuki Ueki is part of a new wave of Japanese tailors trained in the Neapolitan style of suit-making, which are entirely handmade and characterised by soft, light, unstructured forms.

Having enrolled in an Osaka fashion school at 19, upon graduation, Ueki later worked at a Japanese ready-to-wear suit factory… until the Neapolitan style of tailoring from southern Italy caught his eye.

So, off to Naples he headed, where, for two years, he apprenticed under master tailor Antonio Pascariello, and earned the affectionate nickname “Ciccio” in recognition of his high-quality workmanship.

Ueki liked the name so much that he used it later for his own, bespoke atelier… Ciccio opened in Minamiaoyama, Tokyo in 2015, seven years after he returned from Italy.

View the original video here.