There’s no Redwood in Japan yet. They tried to bring the cool retro show over to Japan along with the help of SpeedHunters last year but had to cancel due to the severe lack of participants. Perhaps Japan isn’t quite ready for an American-based retro car show but that doesn’t mean there’s no appreciation of neo-classic cars in the Land of the Rising Sun.
The Nostalgic2days, commonly referred to as nos2days, is an annual show celebrating all the cars that made the current crop of enthusiasts in Japan tear up in their rose-tinted glasses. It’s a collection of some of the raddest cars primarily from the decades stretching across Japan’s economic boom; the 70s to the early 90s. That should give you an idea of how old the average Japanese petrolhead is.
While it’s a JDM-centric show there was still a nice balance on European and American cars to get all nostalgic with too. Some of the highlights included a genuine Mercedes 560SEC 6.0 Widebody, an original Ford GT40, and a Porsche 904 GTS. Not to be outdone, the Japanese brought along some real gems in the form of the 007 Toyota 2000GT, Honda’s first Formula 1 car the RA271, and many many Skylines. No, seriously many Skylines. Of course the Supra was well represented too.
The best thing about the nos2days show is that it’s relatively small. Yes, it’s grown every year since I first attended in 2017 but for the most part it a relaxing show to attend. You don’t have to push through thousands of people to enjoy the cars like you would at Tokyo Auto Salon. However, like TAS, most of the cars on display here are for sale. So should one tickle your fancy you could in theory take one home with you at the end of the show.
Should they be out of budget you could go to the swap meet section of the show and find a miniature version of your favourite car among the dozens of model car vendors. Going through and finding your favourite cars and the best deals was almost as fun as seeing the cars from the actual show.
Here’s a quick gallery of some of the raddest cars at the 2020 Nostalgic2days show:
