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Coastal Maturation at SAKURAO Brewery and Distillery in Hiroshima
SAKURAO BREWERY AND DISTILLERY, located in Hatsukaichi City, Hiroshima Prefecture, was featured in Otoko no Kakurega Digital. The online article was published on August 15, 2026, after originally appearing in the magazine’s February 2026 issue.
Between the Seto Inland Sea and the Chugoku Mountains
The article traces the distillery’s roots to Chugoku Jozo, founded in the Taisho era. The company began whisky production in 2017 in Sakurao, where the Seto Inland Sea lies to the south and the gently rolling Chugoku Mountains to the north.
According to the article, the area’s seasonal temperature variation is an important part of the maturation environment. The coastal warehouses are also exposed to the atmosphere of the Seto Inland Sea.
Two Maturation Environments
The article distinguishes the coastal SAKURAO warehouses from the Togouchi storage site in the mountains of Akiota. Togouchi uses a former tunnel, where a cool and comparatively stable environment is maintained throughout the year.
These two locations provide different conditions for storing the distillery’s whisky stocks: one shaped by the coastal setting and seasonal changes, and the other by a mountain tunnel environment.
SAKURAO Single Malt Japanese Whisky
The article also introduces SAKURAO Single Malt Japanese Whisky, whose stocks are matured at the distillery’s original Sakurao site. It presents the expression in the context of the local sea, mountains and the two storage environments described above.
