Combining the best of both worlds of Japanese garments and Japanese food, Engineered Garments designer Daiki Suzuki has given the crew at Ippudo Japanese Ramen Brasserie in New York a makeover. Instead of the typical all-white or all-black waiters uniform, the restaurant staff are now dressed in a stylish apron-jacket hybrid combo in navy. The collab started out as a simple cotton twill jacket, but thanks to valuable suggestions from the Ramen master Fumihiro Kanagae, the project transformed into a more complex and heavy-duty jacket packing style and functionality. These pieces of re-envisioned workwear are now also being sold at Ippudo’s Midtwon location on 51st Street, priced at approximately $300 USD for the jacket and an extra $100 USD for the apron.

“I wanted it to be something only possible in New York. I wanted it to be the coolest uniform ever. Daiki came up with the design and we all loved it,” says Nakamura. Ippudo NY’s logo is screenprinted on a back pocket of the jacket, a wavy block print meant to signify Ippudo’s translation as “a gust of wind,” but also obscures the letters “N” and “Y” within the design, a nod to the NY locations. Photographer Justin Chung shot the uniforms on Ippudo NY’s kitchen managers.