Chichibu Paris Edition 2025 Ichiro’s Malt Asakusa (LMDW)

Founded in 2008 by Ichiro Akuto, Chichibu has risen fast from a small mountain distillery to one of the most sought names in Japanese whisky. Production is small, around a third of a million litres a year, with floor malting done by hand on occasion and every stage run under one roof. The basin climate swings from humid summers near 35 degrees to winters below freezing, so the casks expand and contract hard and the spirit takes on wood faster than it would in Scotland.

This is unpeated single malt, matured in ex-bourbon American oak. Without an age statement the cask does the talking, esters and vanillin building fruit and vanilla over a young but quickly matured spirit. Ex-bourbon vanillin reads as vanilla and oak lactones as coconut. The spirit character stays fruit forward, apple and pear over a soft, malty body and a gentle spice.

This release was drawn from the distillery's own stock and bottled in 2025. It is a run of 2484 bottles, an event release, bottled by La Maison du Whisky. Each cask is bottled on its own terms, a snapshot of how a particular wood shaped the Saitama spirit. Bottled at 50.5%, natural colour and not chill filtered.