Eigashima Distillery

The White Oak Distillery, sometimes known as the Eigashima distillery, located in Akashi City, Hyogo Prefecture, is primarily a sake and shochu producer but it is technically Japans oldest whisky distillery. I say technically because despite being founded in 1919 whisky production has been limited and only became regular in 1984 and the sites stills are presently used for whisky production only 2 months a year. The domestic distillery output, which amounts for approximately 70% of the market, in many instances does not meet international whisky standards as these are made using molasses. Export varieties although inline with international standards have seen only slow uptake though the brand is beginning to penetrate European and American markets. White Oak Distillery The small, lesser-known White Oak Whisky Distillery is located on the seafront in the coastal town of Akashi, in the Eigashima district. It is part of the Eigashima Shuzo Co. Ltd., which was founded in 1888. Initially, only sake, the traditional Japanese rice wine, and shōchū, a distillate that can be made from various raw materials such as rice, barley or potatoes, were produced. Later also wine and umeshu, a liqueur made from the ume fruit, often referred to as “Japanese plum wine”. 1919 - that year Eigashima Ltd. the state license for whisky production - can be seen as the founding year of the White Oak Distillery. At that time there was no whisky distillery there and in the legal sense the distillery was and is not an independent company. It was not until the whisky boom in Japan that the decision was made to produce its own malt whisky in the mid-1960s. A pair of two small pot stills with a capacity of 1000 liters each was installed. From the beginning, whisky production was only seasonal: sake was brewed from September to March, shōchū was produced from April to May and from June to July - later extended to May to July - the two pot stills were in operation and distilled malt spirits. In 1984 the distillery finally took on its current form: The plant moved to a new still house built on the company’s premises and the old stills were replaced with two larger, steam-heated pot stills, a wash still with 4500 liters and a spirit still with 3000 liters . These were previously in the Japanese Silver Distillery in Nara, which was closed in 1963. Both were rebuilt by the Japanese company Miyake and given new floors. This quadrupled the capacity of the distillery. The building that was previously in use was subsequently converted into a racked warehouse.