Pirono

You know how Koriyama got its first craft beer brewery in June 2024? That was PIRONO BEER. It was started by representative Takahiro Sato as something he could do for Koriyama.

That's right. Sato trained for four and a half years at a brewery in Nagano run by an Englishman, where he learned about long-aged beers and wild-yeast fermentation. He's a brewer with strong European-style expertise.

The core styles are things like saison and bitter, where depth matters more than flash. Their flagship beer, "Breathing," is a 6.5% Belgian IPA. It combines the fruity character of Belgian yeast with German noble hops and American aroma hops, giving it a muscat-like fruity aroma.

They also have another beer called "Resonance," a 5% session IPA with a light citrus flavor and gentle malt sweetness. They keep six taps running, with originals priced at 750 yen and guest beers at 900 yen.

This is the cool part: they renovated a roughly 100-year-old stone warehouse in Domae-cho. It used to be a sake storage warehouse. You can sit at the counter, drink freshly brewed beer, and snack on house-made ham and liver.

Exactly. Their concept is a "beer shop for the neighborhood," and Sato also plans to brew beers using Fukushima-grown ingredients, so there's plenty to look forward to.