Long before Ryu Kyogoku stood on an international winner’s podium, he was a boy trying to find his place. Originally from Shanghai, he moved to Japan with his mother at twelve. In the personal history published on his brand’s website, he recalls struggling with Japanese, enduring bullying and having little sense of direction. Discovering hairdressing gave him something he could develop with his own hands: a skill that could change how a person looked, felt and connected with others.
Today, Kyogoku, known as KG, is taking the expertise behind his 2018 International Visionary Award victory in London’s Cut & Colour category into the products people use at home. In an interview with Editor-in-Chief Hannah Yang, he discussed the relationship between his journey, his product development philosophy and his ambition to make professional haircare available beyond the salon chair.
His account begins with a personal transformation. As he became more interested in grooming and hair, the responses he received from people around him changed. Hairdressing offered a way to communicate through visible results. The craft became both a career direction and an opportunity to help other people experience the confidence he had begun to discover himself.
He entered beauty training while working in a salon, developing his skills through study and practice. In 2016, he travelled alone to London, where he completed courses at Vidal Sassoon Academy, TONI & GUY Academy and SANRIZZ Academy during approximately six months of study. Working alongside other creative professionals broadened his understanding of what hairdressing could become.
The competitive results came in stages. In 2017, he finished runner-up in the Cut & Colour category of the Alternative Hair Show’s International Visionary Award. The following year, he returned to win that category. Those consecutive results trace the progression of a practitioner developing his work against an international field. The 2018 title remains the specific competitive achievement behind his world champion reputation.
Business development followed its own course. He opened SalonRyu in Tokyo’s Akasaka district in July 2017, established Kyogoku Professional in 2019 and launched Kyogoku Academy in 2020. Together, salon services, products and education gave his expertise several ways to reach customers and fellow professionals.
Product development addressed a practical limit. However many appointments a hairstylist accepts, personal service reaches only a finite number of people. Kyogoku wanted his knowledge to benefit consumers who would never sit in his salon. That meant translating the problems he encountered at work into products with a clear purpose in everyday routines.
In the interview, he described a development process involving more than 300 participants in product testing, with their feedback informing repeated refinements. The emphasis was on understanding how products performed in actual use. His published brand story also describes numerous development meetings and repeated factory visits, reflecting his involvement in bringing products from an initial idea to a form he could recommend to professionals.
His approach brings two kinds of knowledge together. A hairstylist can identify technical concerns and assess a formulation or tool through professional experience. A consumer can explain what it feels like to use a product in an ordinary routine. Listening to both helps connect the intention behind a product with the experience of the person using it.
That process supports a defining principle of KYOGOKU: individual products should address clearly identified needs. During the interview, Kyogoku explained his preference for targeted products. Different concerns call for different solutions, and the purpose of each product should be understandable to its buyer. For someone choosing a new haircare routine, that clarity gives a useful starting point: identify the problem, then choose the product designed for it.
Two products in the KYOGOKU range illustrate how that thinking takes shape. The Nano Silk Keratin Straight Iron focuses on daily styling. Its published specifications include nine temperature settings from 140 to 220 degrees Celsius, a rotating cord and automatic shutdown after thirty minutes without operation. The brand describes its shape as suitable for both straightening and creating curls, giving users different styling options with one tool.
In its product guidance, KYOGOKU explains that adjustable heat allows users to choose a setting appropriate to their hair and styling needs. The company describes the plate technology and its Keratin Protect System as designed to limit heat and friction damage. The practical focus is on controllable styling: how a tool handles hair, how easily it moves through a section and how it fits into the time available before someone leaves home.
The Blue Purple Color Shampoo BP addresses a different concern: maintaining the appearance of lightened hair between salon appointments. According to the brand, its combination of blue and purple pigments helps counter unwanted yellow tones while supporting the clarity of the intended colour. KYOGOKU also describes the formula as designed to improve the rough, dry feeling sometimes associated with colour shampoos.
Its appeal lies in a specific maintenance task. A customer who has invested in a cool-toned colour needs a way to care for that appearance after leaving the salon. The shampoo puts colour maintenance into a familiar washing routine. Alongside the styling iron, it demonstrates how the brand separates styling and colour care into products whose roles are easy to recognise.
The business now extends well beyond one stylist’s appointment book. KYOGOKU’s professional membership website reports more than 300 products and over 5,000 salons adopting its range. That network represents a route into professional settings where hairstylists can introduce products through their work and explain how they should be used.
Digital commerce provides another route. In a July 2025 company announcement, KYOGOKU reported reaching the top of TikTok Shop’s beauty sales ranking in Japan. Separately, TikTok Shop Japan’s official October 2025 interview confirmed that, soon after the platform’s Japanese launch, the brand generated more than $100,000 in haircare sales during a single shopping livestream.
In that platform interview, Kyogoku linked his content to education: explaining hair concerns, care principles and practical techniques before inviting a purchase. Demonstrations allow viewers to see how a product is handled and ask questions while watching. Professional knowledge becomes part of the buying experience, giving consumers information they can use when deciding whether a product fits their needs.
His wider ambition also includes sharing Asian hairdressing expertise internationally. In his conversation with Yang, he discussed education for professionals working with Asian hair and a brand that customers could recognise across borders. Products, teaching and salon experience all contribute to that direction.
One example he raised was the uncertainty an Asian customer may feel when choosing a salon in an unfamiliar country. He wants the KYOGOKU name to help that person recognise a service grounded in an understanding of their hair. Teaching other stylists provides a way to extend that reassurance beyond his own appointments. For the consumer, the shared thread is continuity: professional knowledge encountered in a salon can remain part of the products and guidance used afterwards, wherever their daily routine takes place.
The connection to his own beginning remains clear. Hairdressing helped Kyogoku discover a skill, a career and a new relationship with confidence. His work now carries that experience into something people can use themselves: a styling tool, a colour-care routine and professional guidance that reaches beyond a single appointment.
