Sometimes the most interesting careers are the ones that were never planned. Sébastien Ricci started his professional life as a technical electrician in Switzerland, designing and working on buildings. Fifteen years later, after leaving a secure career, travelling around the world, learning new languages and eventually moving to Japan, he found himself working at the intersection of design, luxury, hospitality and entrepreneurship. Today, based in Kansai, his ambition is clear: to use his European roots and experience in Japan to create spaces, products and experiences that genuinely connect cultures.
For Sébastien, creativity was always there. The problem was that his original profession did not give him enough room to express it. “I was always creative,” he recalls. Eventually, he reached a point where he decided that continuing along the same path was no longer enough.
Around the age of 30, he stepped away from his career and started travelling. Hawaii came first, where he studied English – and, as he jokes, also found some time to enjoy island life. A professional opportunity unexpectedly followed him there when he was asked to support a boutique project, giving him an early taste of combining travel, design, and international business. Hawaii also changed his life for another reason: there he met the Japanese woman who would later become his wife.
The journey continued through California and London, where he further improved his English. Then came Italy. Despite his Italian surname and family roots, Sébastien had grown up in French-speaking Switzerland and did not speak Italian. Determined to reconnect with that part of his identity, he moved to Turin and began studying the language. In January 2016, that chapter also became the beginning of a new professional career.
From construction to luxury design
Sébastien’s transition into design had actually started through an encounter back in Switzerland. After renovating a commercial space, his work caught the attention of the CEO of a design company looking for premises in Lausanne. What began as a conversation developed into an opportunity to work together.
The company had built its reputation through international clients, with Swiss watchmaker Longines among its first major customers, before expanding its presence in the watch industry and participating in Baselworld.
Sébastien gradually became part of this world, working across Switzerland and Italy and building experience in retail and luxury design. Over time, the business evolved through partnerships with companies involved in the production of watch displays, bringing design and manufacturing capabilities together.
It was a very different world from electrical engineering – but one that made use of the practical skills he had accumulated over the years while finally giving his creative side space to develop.
Building his own path in Japan
Japan eventually became more than a personal connection. It became the place where Sébastien wanted to build something of his own.
After years working within an international design structure, changes within the group created an opportunity for him to rethink his future. Rather than simply continuing under the existing model, he decided to establish his own company in Japan while maintaining a close partnership with his former European colleagues. The arrangement allows him to combine local knowledge and project management in Japan with an established design and sourcing network in Europe.
That combination is particularly important in the industries he serves. Luxury boutiques, hospitality spaces and other international projects rarely involve design alone. Furniture, lighting, materials and numerous specialized elements must all come together – often across several countries.
For Sébastien, the opportunity is therefore not simply to design a beautiful space, but to connect the entire process.
Between Switzerland, Italy and Japan
That cross-cultural position has become one of the defining features of his work.
“What is the difference between me and a Japanese designer? The difference is I can read both cultures,” he explains. His European background brings influences from Switzerland and Italy, while his years in Japan allow him to understand the expectations of the local market.
He does not see this as competing with Japanese designers. In fact, he readily acknowledges Japan’s exceptional design talent. Instead, his niche emerges when a project needs to sit between worlds.
A traditional Japanese restaurant requiring a purely traditional design may not need him. But a company looking to create something that combines Japanese identity with a European perspective – or an international brand wanting its Tokyo or Osaka location to feel different from its stores in Geneva, Paris or New York – presents exactly the kind of challenge that interests him.
Increasingly, Sébastien wants to extend this philosophy beyond interiors into product design. The two disciplines, he believes, can reinforce each other: a product designed for a brand today could become part of a pop-up store or retail experience tomorrow.
Rethinking hospitality in Japan
Another area has recently captured his attention: hospitality and real estate.
As an investor himself, Sébastien sees an opportunity between traditional Japanese monthly apartments and high-end serviced residences. His idea is to create fully furnished spaces offering the design and comfort of a hotel while remaining practical for people staying in Japan for several months.
He has already started testing the concept with an apartment in Osaka. The ambition is not simply to provide accommodation, but to solve some of the challenges he experienced himself when arriving in Japan: finding housing, navigating daily life and, perhaps most importantly, building a network.
Design is again central to the concept. Rather than creating apartments that could be anywhere in the world, he believes international residents often want to feel that they are actually in Japan – without necessarily giving up the comfort they are accustomed to.
“They want a minimum of Japanese touch,” he says. Shoji, materials or carefully selected details can provide that sense of place while maintaining a contemporary international standard.
Finding a voice through podcasting
Sébastien’s curiosity has also taken him in an unexpected direction: podcasting.
A longtime podcast listener, he launched his own show around a year and a half ago after trying unsuccessfully to convince one of his favourite French podcasters to come to Japan. His conclusion was simple: “Why can’t I interview them myself?”
With help from a videographer living nearby, he bought microphones, lights and basic equipment, learned editing software and started producing his own episodes.
What began as a personal challenge quickly became something more. The podcast expanded his network in Kansai and connected him with people who had never known him through his design work. It also reinforced something he already believed professionally: quality matters.
For Sébastien, good communication is not about chasing views at any cost. A strong conversation needs time, good production and respect for the guest. In an era of short clips and attention-grabbing headlines, he is particularly conscious of the balance between visibility and credibility.
Designing connections
Looking across Sébastien’s journey, there is a common thread connecting what at first appear to be very different experiences: electrician, traveller, designer, entrepreneur, real-estate investor and podcaster.
Each step has been about building connections – between technical execution and creativity, Switzerland and Japan, European design and Asian markets, physical spaces and the people who use them.
Today, he sees his position between cultures not as something to overcome, but as an advantage. And from Kansai, he is continuing to explore how design, hospitality and communication can create new bridges between Switzerland, Japan and the wider world.
As he puts it when describing what makes his approach different: “I can read both cultures.”
