Postcards from the Vineyard: What I Learned from Touching Grass in Rural Japan

Ah, harvest season.

It's quite a romantic idea, isn't it?

Being one with nature, feeling the grapes in your hands, and enjoying a cool breeze against your back. That is, until you walk face-first into a spiderweb bigger than your face.

The offending spider in question.

For the third year in a row, we found ourselves in the fields during Japan's harvest season. Contrary to popular belief, it can be quite a hostile environment at times. Creepy crawlies aside, it was hot this year—actually hotter than it's ever been—and still humid. These conditions create the perfect breeding ground for fungal diseases. This means spending even more time in the heat of the vineyards, picking off diseased berries before they get put in baskets to avoid contamination.

Not so romantic anymore, is it?

Yikes.

At times it poured, while other times the ground baked under the intense heat. Yet, we soldiered on with our 'shoganai' attitude and some cold tea.

The Reality of Harvesting

A certain amount of emotional detachment is required to make wines in such inhospitable climates. Perhaps with this detachment comes a degree of mental clarity: just pick, sort, and do what you can with what you get.

This understanding makes it easier to see why Japanese wine typically commands a premium over wines from elsewhere in the world. Yields are low, and the work is labour-intensive.

The Geography of Japanese Wine

In a way, Japan's geography feels a lot like a tasting flight in itself. The climate, and by extension wine styles, gradually evolve from the warm and humid South to the cool and less-humid North. As you might expect, the South has the short end of the stick climate-wise and thus hasn't progressed as quickly as Hokkaido in winemaking.

Yet, people persist. It's because of this persistence that some incredible vineyard adaptations have emerged across these regions.

Unique Wines from the South

Weird and wacky doesn't always mean palatable. However, this time we had a bunch of wines from the South that absolutely slap. Chenin Blanc and Kyoho from Fukuoka, Merlot from Miyazaki, Sangiovese from Okayama—there's so much already going on that it was honestly tough to keep up!

More importantly, a lot of it was completely outside the realm of what we're familiar with. It truly felt like an evolution of the Japanese wine identity.

Case in point: a white wine from Tottori prefecture, made using mountain grapes.

This was all very esoteric, boundary-pushing stuff, but it certainly made us think.

Embracing the Japanese Wine Identity

We believe that for Japanese wine to stand out in such a crowded industry, it should lean into its own identity—with all the challenges that entails. Rather than walking in others’ footsteps, we should make each sip feel like a story only Japan could tell.

Conclusion

As we reflect on this year's harvest, we are reminded of the beauty and complexity of Japanese wine. The journey from vineyard to bottle is filled with challenges, yet it is also rich with stories waiting to be told. Each bottle we uncork is a testament to the hard work and dedication of those who cultivate the land.

We invite you to join us in exploring these unique wines. Together, we can shine a light on amazing small wineries and help grow the Japanese wine scene globally. Let's celebrate the incredible flavors and stories that Japanese wine has to offer.

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In this journey, we find not just wine, but a connection to the land and its people. So, let's raise a glass to the future of Japanese wine!