Château Mercian Winery Guide

This tour of Château Mercian, Katsunuma Winery, will last for approximately 90 minutes. Before we tour our facilities and taste 6 different varieties of our wine at the wine gallery, please join us for a short video presentation about Château Mercian. Please have a seat while you view the 8-minute video presentation about our wineries, our history and how we make our red, white and rosé wines. Later, we will walk to the areas where we process, ferment and age our wines.

In this cellar dating from the early twentieth century, you can see 19 French oak barrels, each with a specially assigned number and its accurate maximum volume rating. Although large oak barrels and stainless steel tanks often look identical in size, their actual volumes vary considerably, so the Japanese tax authorities had the winery develop painstaking methods for measuring volume. Thus, a newly acquired barrel, whether produced overseas or domestically, is filled with a known quantity of water and then the water level inside the tank is checked with a measuring rod reserved specifically for that tank or barrel in order to accurately determine its total volume. By doing so, the winery can quickly and accurately determine the amount of tax it must pay to the Japanese tax authorities. From 1975 to the year 2000, large numbers of sommeliers from around Japan were invited to try wine straight from these barrels! Of course the amount the sommeliers consumed was reported to the tax authorities. It is interesting to note that the beam at the entrance to this cellar had to be shaved down in order to get these large barrels into the cellar. Some of these barrels were in use as recently as 2010.

Before the Showa period, which started in 1925, wine was fermented in huge sake vats made from Japanese Cedar. Now, stainless steel and French oak dominate. Interestingly, cedar vats identical to these are still used in the fermentation of Japanese sake, soy sauce and miso!

This artwork by Eita Shinohara is a 1970s representation of the process of wine making from the vineyards to shipping the finished product. The art captures two periods of history, the Meiji period of Japanese industrialization and the retro-chic of the 1970s.

Daikokuten, one of Japan’s seven lucky gods, is shown holding a wine barrel. He is usually depicted standing on two large bales of rice, holding a magic wishing mallet in his right hand, and a treasure sack over his left shoulder. The treasure sack becomes the wine! The name Daikoku, written in Japanese logograms, which was the trademark of the winery in the early days, can also be seen on wooden crates by the belt-driven grape crusher.

In order to promote his wine throughout Japan, Kotaro Miyazaki invited liquor shop owners to tour local vineyards and try his wines. He promoted wine as a tonic for good health. In fact, during the Meiji period from 1868 to 1912, associations of sake produces made efforts to keep wine and beer out of liquor shops. Thus, Miyazaki and other early wine producers began to promote their wines at drug stores. You can still find alcohol in Japanese drug stores today.

In one of the large barrels displayed on the upper floor, you’ll see 4 wine bottles. The red wine on the far left was filled in 1879 by Masanari Takano, one of the founding fathers of Japanese wine. This bottle is the oldest bottle of Japanese wine that still has its original Burgundy pitch (spruce resin) seal. The white wine beside it is sealed with wax. The two bottles on the far right are from France.

In 1919, this new processing and storage annex was added to the winery to help meet increasing demand for wine. This type of water wheel, known technically as a breastshot wheel, was suited to a large volume of flow falling from a moderate height. Such water wheels were once the most common type in the US and are said to have powered its industrial revolution. You can still hear the water flowing by the antique, belt-driven grape crusher. On the left as you exit the building, you will be able to see the narrow canal which carries the water that once powered this wheel.

In the early 1980s, dry Kōshū white wines started to be produced at Château Mercian using the Sur Lie method of allowing the wine to have longer contact with the lees (sediment of dead yeast), thereby imparting greater depth and complexity of flavor to the wine. After 6 or 7 years, Château Mercian decided to share the know how of Sur Lie with the surrounding wineries in order to create a more renowned wine region. In the late 1990s, wine advisors such as Paul Pontallier of Château Margaux in the Médoc region of western France, visited Château Mercian to help ascertain the best way to improve Japanese wines. Instead of competing in the crowded full-body sector, it was decided to focus on delicate wines to accompany Japanese and other lighter cuisines. Much like Muscadet, which is also aged on the lees, Koshu began to be promoted as a wine to accompany seafood, particularly oysters. Like Muscadet, the moderate alcohol level of Koshu allows it to complement dishes without overwhelming them.

Pergola (overhead trellises) can support huge trunks and high volumes of large grapes which is ideal for the growers of Japan’s legendary table grapes. Table grapes can fetch as much as ten times the price of wine grapes. However, vertical shoot positioning is a much better training system for the production of wine grapes because it allows you to plant trunks closer together, and it is easier to reduce yields in order to get sweeter, more flavorful fruits with 22 to 23% sugar content. These days, Château Mercian is taking greater control of its grape production in order to increase the quality of its harvested grapes.