TenGrainBread 

Italian frames have been a symbol of wealth and status in the US over the decades and captured the attention of many C&Vers since youth. Hard to get that image of the shine coming off your dentist's Colnago out of your head - they call it a formative experience!

Yet many people have seen and ridden handmade Japanese frames. 3rensho, Toyo, and others made many of the first production high end frames for Specialized, Ritchey, and a few other American brands. They also have made thousands of custom bikes under their own brands over the decades. Many frames exported but their own branded frames tended to stay domestic in Japan. Just because they weren't exporting as much as the Italians doesn't mean they are irrelevant or "esoteric". Nor does it mean that there's actually something special about the high end Italian bikes compared to the high end Japanese ones, besides the cultural infatuation that men of a certain age have for them.

I would highly recommend taking a few minutes to look through the pictures from this bike shop in Japan called Shinkai Cycle. The man has a constant stream of NOS classic Japanese handmade bikes coming through, whether racing frames, randonneuring, even some early MTBs here and there. There are some amazing bikes. LINK