“You Don’t Need Experience” — Ian Chang, from Kavalan to Japan (Part 4, final)

2026.8.18

In short: Part 4, the last of my series on Ian Chang’s tasting night. Ian joined Kavalan at its founding in 2005, left in 2020 and came to Japan with Komoro Distillery. He doesn’t hire from other distilleries; he brings up graduates from zero, as he himself started under Dr. Jim Swan — because “you don’t need experience; what matters most is passion,” and he spots it by “sixth sense.” Plus Shibuya-san, the young blender with a doctorate who translated that night. By Mika Tanimoto, Bar Little Happiness, Hiroshima.

“You don’t need experience. What matters most is passion.”

Ian said it plainly, looking straight at me.

Part 1 was about the connections that made this evening happen.

Parts 2 and 3 were about Komoro Distillery’s whisky itself.

This last part is about the person behind all of it — Ian Chang’s path, and the philosophy underneath it.

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(Photographed at Kavalan Distillery, June 2026)

From Kavalan to Japan

Ian joined Kavalan in 2005, at its founding.

Kavalan went on to be named the world’s best single malt, and reached the top.

In 2020 he left, met Shimaoka-san of Komoro Distillery and KDI, and came to Japan.

“Japan is one of the most refined countries in the world — to live in, and to make whisky in.”

I’ve written in more detail about his years at Kavalan, and how he came to cross over to Japan.

→ Ian Chang: where he began, and what gets passed on

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What matters most is passion

Two young blenders had come with him.

What surprised me was that neither had been hired away from another distillery. Both had joined straight out of university.

One of them is Shibuya-san.

He holds a doctorate.

That isn’t something you pick up easily.

Years of research, a thesis, and a hard examination by specialists before it’s granted.

Someone who has trained, thoroughly, in thinking things through from the root.

And he came into whisky from a completely different world, with nothing, and started from zero.

“It’s precisely because there’s no experience that passion matters.”

Ian doesn’t take staff from other producers.

He brings up graduates starting from zero, himself.

He did the same thing himself — no experience, learning under Dr. Jim Swan, and pushing Kavalan to the top of the world.

Winter at Komoro drops to minus ten.

In that cold, you get up at four in the morning and go to the distillery.

You can only do that, he says, if you have passion.

So how do you spot that passion in an interview?

His answer was simple.

“Sixth sense.”

Talk to someone, and instinct tells you what kind of person they are.

So far, he says, that instinct has never once been wrong.

As he said it, the way he looked at those two young men was very warm. That stayed with me.

And the person translating for him that night was Shibuya-san — the one he had chosen.

He had read and written English for his research, but only started speaking it after joining Komoro.

Even so — because he stands closest to Ian — he wasn’t simply swapping words. He took in what Ian meant, and the feeling behind it, and filled in what was missing as he translated.

After that evening, there was something I badly wanted to make happen.

An evening with Sakurao Distillery — the other producer I champion.

I knew I was asking too much.

Shibuya-san never once treated it as a nuisance. He answered carefully, and honestly, every time.

What he could do, he took on: I’ll try. What was difficult, he explained, with the reasons attached. He chose words that respected the other person. Across all that back and forth, every message carried the same honesty.

And he moved a tight schedule around, and brought that evening into being.

Someone with credentials like that, and entirely unassuming, straightforward, warm. That’s the kind of person he is.

Ian said he chooses staff by sixth sense.

Something in the two of them must have resonated, somewhere deep.

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Sowing seeds thirty years out

Komoro Distillery is a project built with thirty years in view.

Making whisky is like growing a tree.

You may not live to see what you plant today reach full growth.

You plant it anyway. What you know goes to the next generation, and from them to the one after.

“Komoro is our Top Gun school.”

Ian laughed as he said it.

Operators and blenders are trained here, and in time they become the ones teaching at new distilleries.

A second distillery is already under way in Furano, Hokkaido, aiming at a style different from Komoro’s.

Eight pot stills. The plan is to produce three distinct styles from a single distillery.

I’ve written elsewhere about the larger plan Komoro and KDI are working toward, which reaches well beyond Komoro itself.

→ What Komoro and KDI are aiming at: Shimaoka-san, and the Furano project

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Japanese whisky, from the inside

Ian said this.

“We are making Japanese single malt. As part of this industry, I want to build relationships within it.”

Precisely because he came from Taiwan, he holds becoming part of the Japanese whisky industry as something that matters.

Deepening relationships with other distilleries, talking with them, exchanging what sharpens each other, and contributing to the industry.

A man who came from Taiwan, making Japanese whisky in earnest — not as an outsider, but as one of them.

In Part 1, I wrote that whisky is a language between people.

That, I think, is how he lives.

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Something I’ll keep for life

This evening began with a connection.

New make that smells of peaches, water fifty years in the ground, peat burned at Christmas.

And the passion that produces each glass.

The man who made the best whisky in the world, at my counter, talking through each pour in his own words.

Every guest who came was taken by who he is.

For me it was a night that shook me, hard, and it was something apart.

A legend among makers worldwide, and his respect never slips, for anyone.

Not stopping at being remarkable himself, but bringing up those behind him, and working toward what comes next.

All of it, helplessly, magnificent.

I learned about whisky, and about how to live.

How a maker is always shows up in the whisky, exactly as it is.

Komoro’s whisky will be harmonious, and beautiful. I’m certain of it.

Bar Little Happiness turned twenty in July.

There was a great deal that was hard, and a great deal that stung.

I wanted to walk away more than once.

And I’m glad I kept going.

That a night this good would happen in my life 😭

This memory alone will carry me another thirty years.

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Every encounter is meant to be

The man who took Kavalan to the top of the world in Taiwan, crossing the sea to Komoro Distillery in Japan.

And waiting there was water that takes fifty years to surface.

Ian has a gravity to him, and things are drawn toward it.

Shibuya-san, who threw himself into a completely new world.

And me, pulled toward Komoro.

Somewhere at the edge of all that, Ian found my small blog.

And that night came into being, at a small bar in Hiroshima.

Each looks like chance on its own. Looking back, one gravity drew all of it together. There is a Japanese word, hitsuzen — the idea that it was always going to happen.

Everyone who sat at this counter that night.

And you, reading this to the end.

You are part of this story now.

It looks like chance, and I think whisky carried it here, and it was always going to happen.

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Komoro’s first release comes in November 2026.

When it does, let’s tip a glass together and carry this long story further.

To Ian, and to Shibuya-san and Mori-san, Komoro’s blenders of the future.

Thank you, truly, for a night like that.

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Whisky and rum taste better when you know the hearts behind them.

Every encounter is meant to be. Welcome to the world of Rum & Whisky.

— The Komoro Distillery / Ian Chang tasting series —

Previous ← Part 3: Gentle peat to burn at Christmas – Komoro Distillery’s aging and blending philosophy

Back to the start → Part 1: Whisky was the language between us

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From a tasting evening with Ian Chang of Komoro Distillery. Bar Little Happiness / Mika Tanimoto

🔗 Online shop: https://shop.little-happiness.jp/

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