土 · 食 · 縁 — Soil · Food · Community · Kyoto, October 2026
Kyoto in October is the reason you come: maples, temples, food, and the art season. Twenty minutes west is the reason you stay — the river valley that has fed the old capital for centuries, where rice grows, soy sauce ages in cedar and old fermentation techniques are passed down through generations. For a few days each autumn, it opens to outsiders.
The idea
Everyone photographs the temples. Almost nobody crosses the hills behind them — to the river valley that has fed the old capital for centuries, where rice grows, soy sauce ages in cedar and old fermentation techniques are passed down through generations.
This October the valley opens: fields, breweries, kitchens, tastings, long tables, and conversations with the producers themselves — a real working festival that invites a very small number of outsiders in.
The three ways of exploring the festival
For chefs and food professionals: an extended stay inside Japan's regional food system — soil, fermentation, agriculture and the people keeping it alive.
For travellers: Kyoto at its best — a private gastronomy dinner at Six Senses, the Art Biennale — then a full day inside the festival and a 3-day retreat of your choice.
One day. One valley. Both Chefs and Travellers from around the world unite with cooks from Kyoto-Tamba, hands full of ingredients grown right here, making dishes that could only be born in this place. The festival's theme, championed by Kameoka City, is PLANT-BASED: meet the land, meet the growers, and taste what happens when agriculture, environment and local life come together.
