The name Hirooka consists of two Japanese characters: Hiro (broad) and Oka (hill). The district spans the second (middle) terrace of the Narai River’s fluvial plateau and the left bank of the Tagawa River.
DOMAINE SOURIRE winery is located on the upper terrace of Kikyogahara, whereas the majority of the Hirooka-Goubara district is situated on the middle terrace. Vineyards in Hirooka are primarily cultivated on the middle terrace of Hirooka-Goubara and Hirooka-Kataishi.
SOURIRE—our winery and bakery’s name—is derived from the French word for “gentle smile.” It embodies the hope that customers will naturally smile while enjoying SOURIRE’s wine and experience warmth and happiness when savoring its rice flour bread.
Our vineyards are spread across Shiojiri City. While the terroir varies from site to site, making vineyard management and maintenance challenging, we have turned this into an advantage. By cultivating grape varieties best suited to each vineyard and vinifying the grapes separately, we produce a distinct label from each site—essentially, one wine per plot.
Rubaiyat Wine (Marufuji Winery Co., Ltd.), established in 1890 in Katsunuma-cho, Kōshū City, Yamanashi Prefecture, earned the highest honor, the Platinum Prize, at the WASHU AWARDS 2024 for its 2012 Rubaiyat Merlot Prestige. This competition, held in Hong Kong in November 2024, brought together sommeliers from across East Asia to judge Japanese wine and sake.
This wine was produced in 2012, a year characterized by favorable weather conditions that enabled the harvest of high-quality grapes. Only the finest Merlot grapes were carefully selected from contract growers in Shiojiri City for winemaking. The collaboration between Katsunuma and Shiojiri was founded on cooperation and mutual support between grape growers and winemakers, spanning two generations.
The historic highway branching off from Seba-juku on the Nakasendō and leading to Matsumoto Castle was developed during the Edo period along the second level (middle terrace) of the Narai River’s fluvial plateau. Goubara-juku was the first post town on the route from Seba-juku to Matsumoto, and even today, traditional honmune-zukuri manor houses remain, offering a glimpse into the past.
The town sits approximately 10 meters above the Narai River’s riverbed on a plateau with poor water retention. Due to this geographical challenge, significant effort was made to dig wells and secure a water supply for the post town.
The origins of the EPSON Hirooka Office can be traced back to November 1969, when it was established as a branch of Shinshu Seiki Co., Ltd., headquartered in Suwa City, according to records from the Shiojiri Chamber of Commerce & Industry. In 1968, Suwa Seikosha Co., Ltd. developed the world’s first small electronic printer, the EP-101, and in 1970, Shinshu Seiki Co., Ltd. established a production line for the EP-101 at its Hirooka factory (according to Epson Elements, published in June 2020).
Shinshu Seiki was renamed Epson Corporation in 1982 and became Seiko Epson Corporation after merging with Suwa Seikosha Co., Ltd. in 1985. The brand name “EPSON” reflects the company’s aspiration to create numerous “offspring” (“SON”)—valuable products and services across various fields—just as the EP-101 once introduced new value to customers.
