A 100% Merlot grown at roughly 800 metres above sea level in Tsugane, Yamanashi.

BEAU PAYSAGE Tsugane La Montagne 2023 comes from Eishi Okamoto’s small estate in Hokuto, in the mountainous north of Yamanashi Prefecture.

Merlot is also where the story of BEAU PAYSAGE began. Okamoto cleared land in Tsugane, planted Merlot in the late 1990s and released his first vintage in 1999. La Montagne remains one of the clearest links to that starting point.

Tsugane: a high-altitude wine site in Yamanashi

Tsugane lies in Hokuto City, Yamanashi, one of Japan’s most important wine-producing prefectures.

The BEAU PAYSAGE vineyards sit at around 800 metres above sea level. Days can be warm, but summer nights are comparatively cool, creating a pronounced difference between daytime and night-time temperatures.

Okamoto has described this temperature range as one of the conditions that helps grapes build flavour concentration while retaining definition.

For international readers, the elevation matters. Yamanashi is not one uniform warm basin: Tsugane is a cooler highland site, and that setting is central to the style of its Merlot.

Merlot was the beginning of BEAU PAYSAGE

Eishi Okamoto studied winemaking at Yamanashi University before working at a winery in Katsunuma and later establishing his own project.

After searching for a suitable site, he settled in Tsugane and began with Merlot.

The first BEAU PAYSAGE release, from the 1999 vintage, was centred on 100% Merlot. The estate later expanded into Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, but La Montagne remains closely tied to its original variety.

The wine that changed one critic’s view of Japanese wine

A useful reference point for the reputation of La Montagne is the 2009 vintage.

In 2023, Vinous critic Neal Martin revisited the 2009 Tsugane La Montagne and wrote that it changed his perspective on Japanese wine.

His account described a highly hands-on approach for that vintage: organically farmed Merlot, hand destemming, basket pressing, fermentation without temperature control or added sulphur, oak ageing, gravity bottling, and no fining or filtration.

Those details relate specifically to the 2009 wine, but they help explain why BEAU PAYSAGE became an important reference for artisanal Japanese Merlot.

A vineyard area of only around three hectares

BEAU PAYSAGE farms only around three hectares in total.

This is not a large commercial estate. Okamoto works at both the vineyard and cellar level, keeping the scale deliberately close to the land.

That small physical scale is one reason the wines are so difficult to find. Their scarcity begins in the vineyard, before questions of distribution or secondary-market demand even enter the picture.

What “BEAU PAYSAGE” means

BEAU PAYSAGE means “beautiful landscape” in French.

The name fits Okamoto’s broader philosophy: the aim is not to make cellar technique the main subject, but to let the landscape of Tsugane remain visible through the wine.

La Montagne 2023 is therefore best approached not simply as “Japanese Merlot,” but as Merlot from a very specific high-altitude place, made at an unusually small scale.

BEAU PAYSAGE Tsugane La Montagne 2023

Japan | Tsugane, Hokuto, Yamanashi | Red wine | 100% Merlot | 2023 | 750ml | 11.5% ABV

La Montagne connects the 2023 vintage back to the origins of BEAU PAYSAGE: Merlot grown at around 800 metres in Tsugane, from one of Japan’s smallest and most closely followed artisanal wine estates.

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