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A Back Bar Where Category Boundaries Begin to Blur

On a Bangkok night, I’d like you to slowly take in the back bar of a small, unassuming spot｜left to right, if you can. Next to a cask-aged rice shochu from Minamiuonuma in Niigata sits an amber-hued kokuto (brown sugar) shochu from the Amami Islands. Further along, a seven-year, oak-aged awamori from Nakijin in Okinawa waits its turn, followed by a Pinot Noir from Yoichi in Hokkaido. Beside it rests a French craft gin, distilled from hand-picked botanicals in the Loire Valley. A decade ago, such a lineup might have seemed unlikely. Clear lines divided where each belonged｜sake in Japanese restaurants, gin in bars, wine in Western dining rooms. In 2026 Bangkok, those lines are quietly beginning to dissolve.

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When the Five Senses and Data Meet in the Same Brewery

Visit a sake brewery in Japan, and you may see the tōji cup the air of the kōji room in their palm, reading temperature and humidity through the skin. “Brewing with the five senses” is a beautiful phrase. But when the person who possesses those senses is nearing their seventies, with no successor in sight, a reality emerges that beauty alone cannot resolve. As of 2026, Japan has roughly 1,100 sake breweries, representing less than half the number seen at the industry’s peak in the 1970s. Many closures are driven by a lack of successors and labor shortages. When a brewery shuts its doors, the rules of thumb stored in the tōji’s mind, such as “At this air temperature, stir the moromi 30 minutes earlier” or “When the aroma of the kōji changes like this, lower the temperature by 0.5°C,” are often lost without ever being passed on. Now, quietly but unmistakably, a movement is spreading to preserve that “vanishing intuition” as data and hand it to the next generation.

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At the Foot of Nakijin Castle

In Nakasone, Nakijin Village, Kunigami District, in the northern part of Okinawa’s main island, there is a distillery where 35 large storage tanks stand quietly at the foot of the Nakijin Castle Ruins, one of the sites that make up the UNESCO World Heritage “Gusuku Sites and Related Properties of the Kingdom of Ryukyu.” Founded in 1948, Nakijin Shuzo Co., Ltd. is the only distillery in Nakijin Village. Over more than 70 years since the chaos of the postwar era, the distillery has refined its long-aged kusu, or mature awamori, into a series named “Sennen no Hibiki” ｜ “Echoes of a Thousand Years.”

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From the Cellars of Tatsugo to Brown Spirits

Nestled in Ogachi, Tatsugo Town, within Kagoshima Prefecture’s Oshima District, Machida Shuzo rests between deep subtropical greenery and the coral reef seas. Kokuto shochu, crafted from brown sugar, holds a geographical indication that restricts its production strictly to the Amami Islands. Within this protected heritage, Machida Shuzo presents Honkaku Shochu “Sato no Akebono Gold” as an alternative philosophy for enjoying kokuto shochu. At 43% ABV in a 720 ml bottle, it pours into the glass with a faint amber hue that elegantly catches the light. At first glance, it could almost be mistaken for whisky. Yet, its true identity remains a honkaku shochu, born from Amami brown sugar and rice koji, then patiently matured in oak casks.

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The Lifecycle of an Opened Bottle

“I want to stock great sake. But when I serve it by the glass, I end up with half a bottle left over.” This is a recurring sentiment voiced by owners of sophisticated Japanese restaurants and wine bars in Bangkok. “I’d like to offer sake by the glass, but the moment I bring in local craft labels or more niche selections, the remainder of an opened bottle simply sits. It feels ungracious to dispose of it, but I cannot serve a pour that has lost its vitality. Ultimately｜what is the true timeframe?”

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Beyond the Glass

In 2025, the number of international visitors to Japan surpassed 42.7 million, marking a new era of global interest. Tourism spending reached 9.5 trillion yen, as travelers increasingly seek immersive cultural experiences over conventional sightseeing. And among the new destinations quietly gaining presence in this experiential landscape are sake breweries across Japan.

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From 27 to Over 140

In 2021, when the Japan Spirits & Liqueurs Makers Association (JSLMA) announced its voluntary standards for Japanese whisky, there were roughly 27 operating distilleries in the country. Just five years later, in 2026, that number has surpassed 140. This rapid proliferation is exceptional by global standards. Yet, this figure does not signify a mere "bubble." Rather, it signals a quiet tectonic shift unfolding across Japan, as distillers in diverse regions seek to capture the distinct character of their land and their own philosophies within casks.

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A Sake-Brewing Craft That Turns Amber in a Snow Cellar

At the foot of sacred Mount Hakkai in Minamiuonuma, Niigata Prefecture, there is a semi-underground storage cellar packed with roughly 1,000 tons of natural snow. This is Hakkaisan Brewery’s yukimuro, or snow cellar. Without any artificial electric cooling, American white oak barrels rest silently in darkness, free from vibration, at a year-round temperature below 4°C. What lies inside them is neither whiskey nor bourbon. It is authentic rice shochu, created by a sake brewery using the techniques and byproducts of sake making. Its name is Hakkaisan Authentic Rice Shochu Oak Barrel-Aged “Fubaika.” Bottled at 40% ABV, this limited production has been quietly crafted since its debut in 2016.

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Japan as a Wine Country

From April 15 to 17, ProWine Tokyo 2026, an international trade fair for wines and spirits, was held at Tokyo Big Sight. A total of 188 exhibitors from 23 countries and regions took part, and of the 22 seminars held during the event, seven focused directly on Japanese wine itself. The globally renowned wine critic Jancis Robinson MW appeared by video in a session titled “The Current State of Japanese Wine,” while wineries from Nagano, Yamanashi, Hokkaido, and Kumamoto took the stage as producers. In its closing summary, the organizers named “Japanese wine” as one of the three major trends of the fair. The other two were rosé wine and the rise of South America. In Tokyo in April 2026, it was quietly recorded that Japan, as a wine-producing region, had taken its place squarely on the agenda of global industry trends.

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In a Distillery Room Engineered by Eiffel’s Team

Combier Meridor London Dry Gin, Infused with the Memory of the Loire In Saumur, within France’s Loire Valley, the doors of Distillerie Combier｜founded in 1834｜open to reveal a 19th-century distillation hall of iron and copper. This space was designed by the engineering team of Gustave Eiffel, the same mind behind the Eiffel Tower in Paris. […]

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The wines of the Loire Valley

I ｜ Domaine Patrick BAUDOIN The reputation ｜ and popularity ｜ of Loire wines is increasing day by day. Until recently, 80% of Loire production was drunk by the French, who are very attached to the region, to the Loire, its emblematic river, component of their intimate identity, and to its delicate wines. Times are […]

CRAFT BEER

The Thirty-Litre Beginning

Baird Brewing Company and Twenty-Five Years Across from Numazu Harbour In the year 2000, on a corner of Numazu harbour in Shizuoka Prefecture, directly across from the fish market, an American named Bryan Baird and his Japanese wife Sayuri stood before a brew kettle of only thirty litres, scarcely larger than a generous household pot. […]

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