The World Wrap Masters took place in Osaka, Japan on 14^th June 2023 and featured some fierce competition. The competition took place at the Osaka Nanko ATC Centre and organised in partnership with Japan Car Wrapping Association.

Hiroki Kawakami was crowned winner and qualifies to compete at the World Wrap Masters Final 2024 at FESPA Global Print Expo 2024 in Amsterdam from 21^st – 22^nd March. This is the third year that Hiroki has won this competition, he was crowned the winner in 2021, 2022 and now once again in 2023. Hiroki commented: “This is such a great honour to win first place again, this is my third win in a row. I appreciate all the hard work everyone did to organise this competition.”

The runners up were Kai Torengobu from the Rinda Factory who came in second place and Kosuke Mine, also from the Rinda Factory who came in third place.

The competitors came from several companies that included Design Lab. Inc, Decorative system, Arai Plan, Boise, Laplus Design, TOI Performance and many more. The competition was tense with 36 competitors competing across several rounds which tested their skills and abilities. The competitors were pushed to their limits with challenges including a creative round, a skills round and the final round which focused on their installation techniques. Head judge, Tadashi Kariya expressed his gratitude “thank you to all the competitors for taking time out of their busy schedules to participate in the competition over 3 days.”

Tadashi was judging alongside Jim Miller who had travelled 24 hours to Japan from the United Sates despite having a recent surgery on his shoulder. They both expressed that the level of competition had increased hugely this year. Tadashi also commented that “I feel that the purpose of this competition has been achieved. The best wrap experts use their skills to solve challenges whilst also meeting, networking and socialising.”

Watch the final competition highlights here. The organisers of World Wrap Masters Japan would like to thank their sponsors Mimaki, 3M Japan, Design Lab.inc, Max Decal, Nakamura Shoji, Flexi Sheild Japan, Decrative Systems and Nitie.