Étienne de Montille is a famous producer in Burgundy with a château in Puligny-Montrachet, a busy winery in Meursault, and an enviable spread, 37 hectares (91 acres), of vines in fancy appellations on the Côte d’Or.
But, atypically for the owner of a Burgundy domaine, he has spread his wings to two more continents by committing himself and his team in 2017 to establishing wine operations in Santa Barbara County in southern California, Racines, and – even more exotically – in Hokkaido, the large northern island that is home to Japan’s ski country. Above is the view from his young vineyard.
This is quite an act of faith on the part of a European. Wine-growing in California may have a long and glorious history but it is still pretty difficult in Japan. Neither the climate nor the landscape are obviously hospitable to the grapevine. Summer rainfall is much higher than ideal.
Monsoons are a regular phenomenon from June to October, encouraging the fungal diseases to which vines are so prone. Growers have to resort to all sorts of unusual ploys to protect their grapes from rot and mildew, including, most photogenically, if most expensively, copying those who grow top-quality table grapes in Japan by providing individual bunches with their own little waterproof umbrellas.
The majority of vines are trained on overhead pergolas, which helps protect grapes from rain damage – a bit like Galicia – but also encourages eye-wateringly high yields. Many of the best vines are trained on wires with yields limited in order to maximise flavour.
And then there is the scarcity of available potential vineyard land in Japan. Anyone who has viewed the countryside from a bullet train can attest to how crowded the country is. Most wine enterprises are tiny with by far the majority of wine producers making only a few thousand cases of wine a year, from vines typically grown on small, leased plots.
This makes it all the more extraordinary that winegrowing has become so popular in Japan. The number of producers has somehow doubled to about 500 in the last 10 years.
Because of the very marked seasonal nature of the climate, the growing season is relatively short. The severity of winters means that some vines don’t bud until May, much later than in Europe, and the vines may not flower until the end of June, and there can be a desperation to pick before snows arrive in November.
The warmest south of the country is generally just too wet for successful grape-ripening and the three leading prefectures for viticulture are all further north: Yamanashi just west of Tokyo, Nagano west of Yamanashi, which benefits from some higher vineyards, and the biggest prefecture of all, the island of Hokkaido in the far north.
De Montille’s interest was piqued on a 2015 visit to Japan. "I was touched by the resilience, determination and humility of winemakers trying to do their best in a very challenging environment to grow grapes and make honest wines with very limited access to everything we take for granted in established wine regions. Some of them said that it could be helpful if some foreign wine estates could come and establish a vineyard in Japan so as to share knowledge and experience, and build bridges." He now has 15 ha (37 acres) of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, with 2023 the first tiny harvest, and a winery in Hakodate.
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