IMO
Sweet potato is placed on both sides of the mash: as the main ingredient and as the koji. Released in 1998, IMO preserves that demanding idea in a 26% expression with a distinct vintage-minded identity.
A mash built entirely from sweet potato
IMO was created by setting aside rice koji and using sweet potato both as the base material and as the medium for koji. It was a technically demanding decision at the time of its first release in 1998, and it remains the point from which Kokubu’s material-led experiments can be read.
A number retained from the first release
The first spirit settled naturally to 26% after storage. Rather than treating the number as a standardised specification, the house kept it as a trace of the original release. Each vintage is bottled without blending across years, allowing the harvest to remain visible in the finished spirit.
Kokubu Distillery works in the Kawahara area of Kirishima, Kagoshima, using groundwater from the Kirishima mountain system. Since its cooperative foundation in 1986, the house has treated shochu as a field for material-led experiments rather than as a fixed recipe.
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