Opening November 2026

Every Room with a Private Onsen and Views of Aso’s Five Peaks

Where fire meets earth. Where land and people keep an ancient promise.
Step into Aso’s raw landscape, where a thousand years of prayer still linger.

ASO RETREAT HONO by Onko Chishin

About the Opening Day Special Plan

The Essence of

Aso Retreat

To meet nature on its own terms.
This is the harmony Aso teaches.
Here, each experience becomes part of a single thread,
tracing the memory of the land.

Story

A land that holds the memory of deep time.
A place where the boundary between people and nature begins to dissolve.

For a thousand years, Aso has been shaped
by the interplay of volcanic forces and human hands.

Step into Aso’s open country and encounter something primal:
the land at its most elemental.

Sunlight cleanses the earth. Black soil drinks the rain.
Tender green shoots unfurl.

Pause within that cycle.
The senses awaken. You return to yourself.

Here, you step into an endless story
still being woven between the land and its people.

TOP_客室セクション1

Room

17 Rooms, Each with a Private Onsen

Set within the Aso Caldera, each room looks out toward Aso’s Five Peaks —
Takadake, Nakadake, Nekodake, Eboshidake, and Kishimadake.

Wide windows and terraces open onto a landscape
that changes with the seasons, the hour, and the weather.

Every room features a private open-air onsen bath, with saunas in select rooms —
an intimate stay immersed in the landscape of Aso.

About the Rooms

Onsen

Heat rises from deep within the mountain — the pulse of the earth made tangible.
Sink into the warmth and feel the weight of your body fall away.

Spring Type: Simple thermal spring (hypotonic, mildly alkaline, low-temperature)
Indications: neuralgia, muscle pain, joint pain, sensitivity to cold, relief from fatigue, and more.

Aso
Foraging
Experience

Beside the restaurant is an edible garden
centered on native plants.
Gather ingredients for dinner just steps away,
then venture deeper into the hills to forage with the seasons.

Return to the primal. Awaken the senses.
Feel Aso with your whole body —
encountering a landscape revealed only
in this season, in this fleeting moment.

Aso Primal
Gastronomy

Follow life back to the sea.
Spring water rises in Aso, gathers into rivers, and flows onward to the waters of Amakusa.

Following the path of this water,
the restaurant brings the land’s enduring cycle
to the table.

The crackle of firewood. The scent of straw.
The forces of sun and wind carried directly into each dish.

Cutting, grilling, boiling:
elemental acts
that carry the memory of fire and wind,
and of a way of eating the modern world has almost forgotten.

About the Restaurant

Executive Chef

Yamato
Imanishi

Born in Kochi Prefecture in 1988, Yamato Imanishi graduated at the top of his class from Ecole TSUJI Osaka before moving to France at age 20 to train under Michel Bras in Laguiole, celebrated for his mastery of herbs.

He went on to hone his craft at acclaimed Paris restaurants Septime and Le Chateaubriand, serving as chef de partie at both.

During his time at Le Chateaubriand in 2011, the restaurant ranked No. 9 on The World’s 50 Best Restaurants list. After gaining experience across five restaurants, including a three-Michelin-starred establishment, he returned to Japan, where he went on to lead the kitchens of several restaurants.

In April 2025, he became Head Chef of LA VIGNE DINING FÛDO at HOTEL LA VIGNE HAKUBA by Onko Chishin. In 2026, he was appointed Executive Chef of ASO RETREAT HONO.

Yamato Imanishi