The Custom Scene

Last year I commented on how people don't really seem to personalise their cars these days and how it's not about individuality anymore, but more of a brag that "My car does this", and "my car does that" but after checking out SEMA this year I realised it's now a bit of both.

People still customise cars for individual tastes, but I think that nowadays there’s a part of people that makes them want to brag. A kind of “go on, I dare you to look under the hood”

To me it’s a little strange how someone just doesn’t care about a car they are building, but they just go at it to be the best, which is fine, but where’s the “I did it cos I felt like doing it” kind of attitude?

Why are people so quick to want to boast and scream at the top of their lungs about how good their car is? I mean, if you go back to the original days of customising, it was done for the love of one’s car; the pride they took in it and not caring what the next guy did.

Now I’m not saying this is true throughout the tuner world, because there really is the guys out there, that do things for themselves, (if you look at the Japanese car culture with the VIP’s, Bosozoku movements, cars who some might call ugly, but to the owners, its their life and soul represented truly by their cars) no matter what people might think.

These are the guys that I admire. Not for what they have done, but what they truly stand by. Their cars. Now I may not like a modified car I come across, but I won’t knock it either. Its fair play if you build something that YOU love and enjoy on a regular basis.

As with the fashion industry, one’s style of clothing might not be for another, but if the person wearing the clothing feels at their best, then that’s all that matters. It’s exactly the same in the tuner world. You “wear” your car, in a way of it makes you feel good driving, spending hours meticulously working on it, cleaning it, to a vision you call perfection.

So is there still a tuner world that only does things for themselves and doesn’t care about what the world will say?

Yes. And thank god there is.