The Terroir Expressed by Sakurao Distillery’s Gin in Hiroshima
Hiroshima Prefecture produces more lemons than anywhere else in Japan. Yet, this agricultural heritage remains a quietly kept secret. Along the warm hills facing the Seto Inland Sea grow lemons, navel oranges, natsumikan, yuzu, and daidai bitter oranges. Each tree bears only one kind of fruit. Each citrus has its own distinct acidity and aroma, and each is harvested in a different season. There is a gin that captures all five of these citrus fruits in a single bottle. That gin is SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL, a Japanese craft gin introduced in 2018 from a distillery in Sakurao, Hatsukaichi, Hiroshima.
The day a century-old sake maker distilled gin for the first time The producer is Sakurao Brewery and Distillery Co., Ltd., a long-established alcohol maker founded in 1918, in the seventh year of the Taisho era. The company had long produced sake, shochu, and whisky, and had accumulated more than a century of distillation expertise since obtaining its whisky license in 1920. Yet, crafting gin remained an unexplored frontier. In 2018, the year of its 100th anniversary, the company opened the Sakurao Distillery and installed a custom-made copper hybrid still from Germany’s Arnold Holstein. Guided by a clear vision—to distill the terroir of Hiroshima—it created its first gin. That debut went on to win Best of Gin at the Los Angeles International Spirits Competition. It was the first time a Japanese gin had achieved that distinction.
Beyond juniper: nine expressions of Hiroshima The definition of gin is simple: a distilled spirit whose primary flavor comes from juniper berries. What makes SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL unique, however, is the way it preserves the backbone of juniper while layering Hiroshima’s terroir beyond it. Of its 14 botanicals, nine are sourced from within Hiroshima Prefecture. At the center are the five citrus fruits mentioned at the beginning: the vivid freshness of green lemon, the sweetness and acidity of navel orange, the tightening bitterness of natsumikan, the powerful fragrance of green yuzu, and the complexity of daidai. Together, they create a multi-layered citrus gradient that no single lemon or lime could ever achieve. Then emerges the soft woody aroma of hinoki cypress bark, the fresh top note of green tea from Fuchu, the vivid accent of red shiso from Yamagata District that appears in the finish, and the crisp spiciness of highland ginger from Miyoshi. The memory of a land held between the Seto Inland Sea and the Chugoku Mountains is sealed inside the liquid. The distillation method is tailored to this botanical composition as well. Bold ingredients such as juniper and citrus peels are steeped directly in the base spirit, while more delicate materials such as green tea and red shiso are extracted only through vapor. These two methods are carried out simultaneously within a single distillation process. That is why weight and lightness coexist here without contradiction.
A quiet accumulation of acclaim Beginning with Best of Gin at LAISC in 2018, SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL went on to earn IWSC Gold Outstanding in 2018, Double Gold at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition in 2019, and the top gold prize at TWSC in 2022, continuing its run of recognition at major international competitions. Reviews from specialist media are equally compelling. The American gin site The Gin Is In described it as having one of the longest finishes of any gin it had tasted in recent years. A member of the TWSC judging committee in Japan described its opening as “as vivid as biting into thick slices of fresh ginger laid over orange.” The structure of the gin—where ginger and hinoki create depth beyond mere citrus brightness—comes through clearly in the tasters’ words.
A category growing against the wind In 2025, the global spirits market slowed down. Gin was no exception. The surge in gin’s popularity during the pandemic had cooled, and sales weakened across many markets. But Japanese gin was a different story. According to data from the Japan Spirits & Liqueurs Makers Association, exports of Japanese gin in 2025 reached 8.2 billion yen, up 104 percent year over year. In a global market that was slowing, a category that doubled its export value was highly unusual. In April 2026, the British trade publication The Drinks Business covered the phenomenon. In the article, a London spirits distributor described Japanese gin as “a cultural bridge” and predicted that it would become “a back-bar staple,” rather than simply remaining a subcategory of gin. The article also cited market research showing that consumers are increasingly drawn to brands that are small-batch, use local ingredients, and offer distinctive flavors. Small-batch production, local ingredients, and a flavor profile all its own. By those three measures, SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL—with its nine Hiroshima-grown botanicals—aligns exactly with what global consumers are looking for.
A new map called “terroir gin” In the world of wine, the idea of terroir—the notion that soil and climate shape a wine’s identity—is taken for granted. In gin, that concept is still far from mainstream. Yet SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL, which sources as many as nine botanicals from a single prefecture and distills the memory of Hiroshima’s citrus, mountain plants, and water into one bottle, gives the phrase “terroir gin” a vivid, tangible meaning. Now, as exports of Japanese gin have doubled and bartenders around the world are beginning to use it in cocktails beyond the classic gin and tonic, the map of Hiroshima’s landscape drawn through a century of distilling expertise offers a profound invitation to understand the cultural and natural landscape of the region. (Mr. Bacchus)
This article is intended solely to explore the distillation techniques and cultural heritage of SAKURAO Brewery and Distillery and the SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL brand, and does not aim to promote or encourage the consumption of alcohol. / บทความนี้จัดทำขึ้นเพื่อนำเสนอข้อมูลเกี่ยวกับเทคนิคการกลั่นและมรดกทางวัฒนธรรมของ SAKURAO Brewery and Distillery และแบรนด์ SAKURAO GIN ORIGINAL เท่านั้น มิได้มีเจตนาเพื่อส่งเสริมหรือโฆษณาเครื่องดื่มแอลกอฮอล์ สำหรับผู้มีอายุ 20 ปีขึ้นไป โปรดดื่มอย่างรับผิดชอบ