The Kyoto Distillery is the Japanese distillery in Kyoto, founded in 2014 by Noriko Kakuda Croll, David Croll and Marcin Miller, the first in Japan dedicated exclusively to the production of gin. It is the home of KI NO BI, a small-batch craft gin inspired by the history and artisan tradition of this millennia-old city.

The founders boast long experience in the world of spirits: in the 1990s Noriko and David started a whisky import business in Tokyo, collaborated with Marcin Miller, then editor of Whisky Magazine, and in 2005 together founded Number One Drinks Company, exporting rare Japanese single malts worldwide. After two years of research and experimentation, in October 2016 KI NO BI Kyoto Dry Gin was launched.

The choice of Kyoto is no coincidence: the city offers the soft waters of Fushimi, famed for centuries for sake, and local ingredients such as yuzu, sanshō and the legendary teas of Uji. For KI NO BI, over 100 botanicals were tested before selecting 11, many sourced from Kyoto Prefecture: juniper, iris and akamatsu red pine as the base; organic yuzu from Ayabe and lemon; sanshō pepper and kinome; ginger; gyokuro green tea; bamboo leaves; and shiso. The botanicals are divided into six “elements,” distilled separately, and then blended with water from a sake brewery in Fushimi.

Today the distillery is part of Pernod Ricard and in October 2025 it inaugurated in Kameoka, in Kyoto Prefecture, a new facility powered exclusively by renewable energy. The range includes KI NO BI Kyoto Dry Gin, KI NO TEA, KI NO BI SEI and KI NO BAI, and among its accolades, the title IWSC International Gin Producer of the Year stands out.

The Kyoto Distillery blends a Japanese soul with the art of gin, paying homage to over a thousand years of Kyoto’s artisan culture.