Description
Mr. Ichiro AKUTO was born in Chichibu City, Saitama Prefecture in 1965. After graduating from brewery studies at an university, he worked at Suntory Holdings Limited.
Later he joined Toa Shuzo Company, a business founded by his grandfather and managed by his father. However, the company was sold due to financial difficulties.
As the buying company decided to withdraw from whisky production, Mr. Ichiro AKUTO took over the unblended whisky of Toa Shuzo produced in Hanyu Distillery and entrusted the care of the unblended whisky to Sasanokawa Shuzo located in Fukushima Prefecture.
In 2004, he established Venture Whisky Co. in Chichibu City, in which 3 years later the Chichibu Distillery was built.
Mr. Ichiro AKUTO worked at Sasanokawa Shuzo as a technical leader, and in 2005 he released a whisky from Sasanokawa Shuzo as the first Ichiro’s Malt.
In 2006, Ichiro’s Malt “King of Diamonds” from Hanyu Distillery was awarded the Gold Medal (after achieving the highest score) in the Japanese Whisky category by Whisky Magazine, a whisky magazine based in the UK.
In addition, Ichiro’s Malt achieved the World’s Best award in the Japanese category of “World Whisky Award (WWA)” for five consecutive years from 2007.
Being in the spotlight, the number of fans of Ichiro’s Malt has been increasing all around the world.
Meanwhile, while learning how to make whisky by visiting Scotland, Mr. Ichiro AKUTO was preparing to open Chichibu Distillery.
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