GRAPES OMOTESANDO

Between Shibuya and Omotesando. Descend a flight of stairs from the street, and jazz is playing low. Seven seats at the counter, eight at tables. A small wine bar of just fifteen seats.

This bar was born from one sommelier's dream.

Yoshinobu Taga served as a sommelier at a number of first-class hotels, beginning with the Grand Hyatt. When GRAPES KITASANDO opened in 2015, he was the opening sommelier entrusted with its wine.

Someday, a wine bar of my own. GRAPES embraced that dream Taga had long cherished deep in his heart, wholeheartedly. We would build a bar with him at its center. And so, in the summer of 2016, GRAPES OMOTESANDO was born.

Taga is a Burgundy lover through and through.

Delicate, aromatic wines with a dignified poise: those are always the bottles that draw Taga in. Of course, his shelves also hold Bordeaux and wines from other regions. But every one of them is a wine he finds elegant, one he truly loves.

The roughly one thousand bottles always on hand are, in a sense, a map drawn by Taga's own taste. Whichever bottle you choose, you can see his face behind it. There cannot be many wine bars this personal.

Taga has long held a vision of the wine bar he wanted: "A wine bar where you can always enjoy many kinds of wine by the glass, and always make new discoveries."

So here, with every change of season, the wines by the glass, chosen grape variety by grape variety, are replaced. Alongside them come house-made chocolates and carefully selected cheeses. Sweetness and salt, acidity and the aromas of age gradually layer upon one another on the palate.

The bar he always wished he could frequent: Taga now creates it, day after day, with his own hands.

Taga is not a smooth operator.

But for that very reason, no one has a warmer heart. He has come through many hard times and painful experiences. Perhaps that is why he can quietly stand beside others in their pain.

More than a few regulars here quietly open up about their troubles across the counter. Taking in their words, Taga chooses a glass just for them.

A distance at which words reach you without raising your voice. You meant to have just one glass, and before you know it, you are on your second. The warmth of human kindness, grown rare in our times, is surely alight in this small basement bar.