Tsukayama Brewery

What Tsukayama Brewery Is

Tsukayama Brewery (津嘉山酒造所, Tsukayama Shuzōsho) is an awamori distillery in Onaka, Nago City, Okinawa Prefecture, whose main house and kōji house of around 1928 were designated an Important Cultural Property in 2009 as the Tsukayama Brewery Facilities, while the garden on the same site was registered as a Registered Monument in 2021. Awamori, Okinawa's distilled rice spirit, is still made in these buildings under the Kokka (國華) label.

According to the Agency for Cultural Affairs, the brewery put up its buildings on this site between 1927 and 1928 and appears to have begun distilling at about that time. A wooden plaque in the main house names the designer, Shimabukuro Jun'ichi, and the builder, Kinjō Tokusaburō. The site lies in the old town centre of Nago, in the southwest of the present city.

The aging buildings later underwent full conservation repairs. According to the Nago City Tourism Association, the work took seven years and was completed in December 2017, after which brewery tours resumed. Distilling carried on throughout the repairs.

The Layout of Tsukayama Brewery

The Tsukayama Brewery plot is roughly rectangular and faces a street on its south side. The main gate stands at the centre of the south boundary, and walls run all the way round. Inside, the main house stands a little south of centre, with the kōji house behind it to the north. An inner wall with its own gate runs north and south from the middle of the main house's south front, dividing the grounds. The garden occupies the east and southeast of the plot.

The Agency points out that the gates, outer and inner walls, the south well and the garden all survive, and that the residential land itself is protected along with the buildings. Walking the inside of the walls shows how distillery, family home and garden were planned as a single compound. The construction of the buildings and the design of the garden are covered on their own pages.

Visiting Tsukayama Brewery

The official website says brewery tours at Tsukayama Brewery are accepted from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and from 1:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m., with the site closing at 5:00 p.m. It is open every day, tours are free, and individual visitors need not book; foreign visitors are explicitly welcome without a reservation. The brewer guides visitors and tastings are offered. Groups arriving by bus are asked to book. Parking is for cars only, given on the website as room for about 20 in one place and about 30 in another; large coaches stop on the main street and passengers walk in.

The brewery is in central Nago. The website directs visitors into the lane beside the NTT Docomo Nago branch, with the entrance about 20 metres along on the left. The lane is narrow, one-way and unsignalled, so drivers should check the direction of entry. From Naha, leave the Okinawa Expressway at Kyoda Interchange and follow Route 58 into Nago. Anyone driving should skip the tasting.