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Chichibu
Chichibu distillery is located within the town of the same name in the Saitama Prefecture of Japan and was the brainchild of Ichiro Akuto, grandson of the founder of the legendary Hanyu distillery. It was opened in 2008 by his company, Venture Whisky, and was Japan's first new distillery since Suntory opened Hakushu in 1973.
The distillery is actually two separate operations, with a new facility known as Chichibu 2 opened in 2019 in order to help it meet increasing demand for its whisky. The majority of production is a non-peated spirit, however around a quarter of the distilling season is also dedicated to peated production.
As is common with Japanese single malts, Chichibu is technically a sub-brand of Venture Whisky's flagship Ichiro's Malt label and is marketed using imagery and an aesthetic design dictated by it. Venture Whisky has also sold single malt from Hanyu and its various blends in the same fashion. The first Chichibu bottlings were released soon after production commenced via a series new make spirit bottlings called Newborn. These continued sporadically until 2011 when the inaugural single malt was released, a 2-year-old titled The First.
Due to the high demand for the distillery's single malt and its limited production capacity prior to 2019, the majority of Chichibu has been released via an extensive single cask programme. These are joined in the portfolio by regular small batch limited editions but as of yet no distinct core range has been introduced.
2008-present
Chichibu Distillery
49 Midorigaoka
Chichibu-shi
Saitama-ken
Japan
Active brands
Single Malt
