021: Haiti 🇭🇹 Rum 2004, 58.6%, 20 YO; BAR LAMP GINZA 20th ANNIVERSARY BOTTLING

Title:Drawing - Dragon (2024)
Artist: Airi Hara 愛梨 原

Haiti 🇭🇹 Rum 2004, 58.6%, 20 YO
BAR LAMP GINZA 20th ANNIVERSARY BOTTLING

DISTILLED 30 JUNE 2004
BOTTLED 04 JULY 2024
ONE OF 159 BOTTLES

ABV - 58.6 %, 70cL

美（び / Bi），is often used to refer to art itself, or the fine arts. This is also Malt, Grain & Cane's ongoing series of collaborations with esteemed Japanese artists. 

Calligraphy artist, Airi Hara, is a young Japanese creator, famous for her unique works of graphic art composing of Japanese Calligraphy characters. She aims to enhance the appeal and value of Calligraphy as "Creative Art" , ", through her activities, all across the world.

Her works express various "souls" through letters, as if these words have a shape, and speak to us. Her goals are to make the first steps, towards a world where calligraphy is popular amongst people.

This barrel has been aged 6 years in the tropics, and 14 years in continental Europe.

Specially bottled for Bar Lamp's 20th Anniversary; and also an homage to their 10th year anniversary bottling...




Congratulations Nakayama-sensei !

Artwork Explanation:

Airi's works often incorporate hidden words / characters in her artwork.

Within the dragon's body, contains the following texts, "January" all the way up till, "December". All 12 months of the Gregorian Calendar year.

The body of the dragon is shaped into a traditional, Japanese knot, called a Mizu-Hiki 水引.

This specific pattern of knot, is called Ume-Musubi 梅結び, or Plum Knot; which often represents unyielding & unwavering strength throughout time, especially enduring through deep, cold Winters 冬 , so that we can cross over to a new year, and towards Spring 春.

The eye of the Dragon, has the word "幸", or Happiness.

⁡

This bottle comes with a free UV torch, for you to unveil the secret message within the artwork!


Tasting Notes by 88Bamboo

Colour: Gold

Aroma: It opens up delicately aromatic, with a light muskiness of tropical fruits of longans and langsat, even some gooseberries and mangosteens, as well as some green bananas - all of which coated in an almost crystalline layer of sweet and rich maltose and honey.

It’s giving tropical fruits in the form of tang-hulu. With time, it’s more on orange blossoms, apricots and a mix of green and ripe mangoes. It’s alittle green, with also some tinned lychees and white dragonfruit. The fruits come together cohesively and the layers of which are subtle yet distinct enough to pick out with time. It’s rather multi-dimensional in its fruitiness - musky, estery, sweet, tart, zesty, green, exotic.

With time it settles on honey, dried mangoes, orange blossoms and some gentle notes of sarsaparilla.

Taste: Medium-bodied, great richness here, it’s got a really good intensity and focus in delivering a fruit basket that is at once distinct yet incredibly cohesive and well-integrated. Again there’s that elegant and crystalline coating of honey and maltose, within which are longans, green bananas, langsat, mangosteens and lychees.

It’s again slightly green, definitely tropical, and with a slight muskiness - a whole bunch of green and white tropical fruits. There’s a nice peppery hit to it as well that perks it up, as well as a gentle acidity that keeps it fresh.

It’s expansive in its fruitiness, with layers that fan out from a concentrated and well-defined core.

Finish: The intensity and power carries through to the finish with that pepperiness, along with the maltose, honey and tropical fruits.

It’s an incredibly long finish, with the richness persistent, with more of the greenness of green bananas and unripe tropical fruits delivering more of that acidity with a slight pucker - that textural tension that builds at the finish is really enjoyable.

A slight bit of diesel and green olives, giving some salinity to it as well, before it’s back to the honey and green tropical fruits.