Hello, everyone.
 After the long winter, spring is finally upon us.
What is it that first comes to mind about spring? Many of you may think about new sprouts and spring flowers that shoot up. That's why we're also excited about the spring news delivered by the fresh yellow-green green tea leaves that are shooting up all around.

 Starting today, OSULLOC will tell you three interesting and marvelous stories of OSULLOC Tea Gardens along with the news of spring on Jeju.

 Do you know Drops of God, the comic by Tadashi Agi?
Drops of God created a sensation in Japan and Korea. It's about Kanzaki Shizuku, the hero, realizing the wonders of wine by searching for the twelve great bottles of wine according to his father's will.

 This book features the term "terroir," among many mysteries of wine, which means "Earth" in French. Terroir is a concept that includes natural conditions such as soil or climate that determine the taste and flavor of wine, along with the brewing technique of the winemaker. It shows the mystery of how a wine can be completely different depending on the soil and climate of the vineyard, environment and method of production, even if the same variety of grapes is used.

 Let's stop for a minute. Did you know that the tea trees cultivated by OSULLOC are also remarkably influenced by the surrounding environment, including the soil and climate, just like the grapes that make wine?

 The three tea gardens in Jeju managed by OSULLOC all look the same on the outside, but have different features and charms. So, today I'm going to tell you the first story about Dolsongi Tea Garden.

 Dolsongi Tea Garden is a covert garden that cannot be found unless you intend to visit, since it's hidden between a piedmont road on the southern part of Halla Mountain and a mountain road in the middle. This place has long been referred to as Dolsongi (clusters of rocks) as there are many pieces of scoria made of volcanic ash, and its region name has now become Dosun as part of the language purification process.

 The five factors of the optimum environment for tea trees provided by the nature of Jeju are soil, light, water, wind and fog. Dolsongi Tea Garden is characterized by light, wind and water.

 Dolsongi Tea Garden was the first of OSULLOC Tea Gardens to be developed, and is the place where OSULLOC was created.
You're all very well aware of the 'beautiful devotion' of Suh Sungwhan, the founder who cultivated the wasteland and created the green tea field right here.

 After planting the first tea tree after reclaiming the rough wasteland of middle mountainous area of Jeju in 1979, he was able to harvest the first tea leaves four years later in 1983.

 Even though it's the smallest and coziest among OSULLOC Tea Gardens in Jeju, Dolsongi Tea Garden is famous for its natural environment that creates great tea with its excellent aroma.

 The top of Halla Mountain seems to be within our grasp, covered in white snow; and the tea garden underfoot is covered in light green. This incredible view, which is created by the snow and green, is a source of wonder, laying the groundwork for the creation of the brand, OSULLOC.

 When you visit Dolsongi Tea Garden for the first time, you'll be surprised by the unique and distinctive geographical conditions there.
First, the Dolsongi Tea Garden is located on the sunny hill in the middle of Halla Mountain that is quite steep, and second is that it is located on the valley where Gungsancheon Stream crosses the south and north of the tea garden.
Let me briefly explain how these geographical conditions affect the quality of tea.

 The sun is one of the most important things in farming. How efficiently we can use the sun, which is the source of all plant energy, serves as a crucial factor in cultivating plants. Dolsongi Tea Garden is located on the hill facing the south, looking over the path through which the sun passes.

 The hill of Dolsongi Tea Garden, which is tilted by about six degrees toward the south, helps it use the sun about 10% more effectively than Seoul. This advantage can be found in many other plants. Grand Cru, the best plantation in Bourgogne, France that is famous for wine, is located at the center of a hill like this. Bourgogne and Bordeaux, where premium wineries are located, feature hills where great premium wine is produced.

Did you know that many of the premium wines that give a certain thrill to the world's wine lovers are in fact named after a hill?

 Dolsongi Tea Garden is the closest of OSULLOC Tea Gardens to both Halla Mountain and the ocean, and it is situated south of the steep Halla Mountain. That's why in Dolsongi Tea Garden, the cold winds blow at night from Halla Mountain with the remains of snow at the top even in April, and warm winds blow in the day from the ocean waters of Seogwipo. As a result, it has the biggest daily temperature range among all the tea gardens in Jeju.

 The bigger the temperature range is between day and night, the harder the plants try to overcome the tough growth environment. This range gives great stress to tea trees, and the trees create the substance called 'aroma constituent' in the process of overcoming this stress, which is the tough growth environment.

 If you look down at Dolsongi Tea Garden from the sky, you can see a stream crossing the middle of the tea garden from south to north, which is called Gungsancheon.

 Gungsancheon is classified as a stream, but it's a dry stream where water doesn't normally flow due to the nature of Jeju's soil where water is not collected in puddles even after the rain. But, on days when there is heavy rain on Halla Mountain, there are currents so swift that cars cannot cross the stream.

 Gungsancheon Stream becomes the channel for the warm, cold winds that pass by Dolsongi Tea Garden day and night.

 Just as the skin becomes dry in the wind, tea trees can also become dehydrated by inconstant winds, and must absorb the deficient moisture through their roots, which also gives stress to the trees.

 In fact, the direction of the wind at the tea garden in April shows that there is only the warm south wind from the ocean and the cold north wind from Halla Mountain, as shown in the image. Finally, in April where the fresh sprouts of green tea finally shoot up after the long winter, the cold wind from the remaining snow on Halla Mountain and the warm wind blowing from the ocean gather at the valley with a huge daily temperature range and fill up Dolsongi Tea Garden's fresh sprouts with an aroma.

 That's why Dolsongi Tea Garden is referred to as the tea garden with the greatest aroma.

 Water is definitely a crucial factor in cultivating tea trees in Jeju, where rainwater is immediately soaked into the soil without creating puddles. To supply clear and fresh water to tea trees, people use clean water resources filtered by multiple layers of Jeju volcanic bedrocks. Water in Jeju is famous for its cleanliness, but Dolsongi Tea Garden is located in a region where there is especially lots of water with great taste and functional components among Jeju's water resources.

 In fact, water from Dolsongi Tea Garden is frequently studied due to its high potential in special ingredients and functions.

 The two masters that led Korean tea culture, Chusa Kim Jeonghui and Choui Seonsa shared a special friendship. Chusa, an artist and scholar who represented the era, sent the calligraphic work 'Illohyangsil' along with a winning letter to get some good tea from Choui, his friend of the same age.
The meaning is 'tea brewing on the brazier is aromatic,' and this calligraphy remains as a tablet writing at Daeheungsa Temple in Haenam, Jeollanam-do today. After more than 150 years, it was reborn as Illohyang in 1999, as the signature master's product of OSULLOC by Amorepacific.

 OSULLOC Illohyang by Amorepacific is created by people handpicking fresh yellowish-green buds that shoot up between the dark green tea leaves on a sunny day after Cheongmyeong, the clear and balmy season of April where the snow still remains on Halla Mountain. Each of the tea leaves picked with sincerity undergoes the profound process of repeated roasting and rubbing by a master's hands in a hot roasting pot.

 OSULLOC Illohyang fully conveys the founder's devotion to reviving the forgotten tea culture in Korea and creating Korea's own unique tea culture. It is rapidly securing its place as a great Korean tea, winning recognition for its quality and value in various tea contests and shows around the world.

 OSULLOC's signature tea, Illohyang, has gained fame all over the world beyond Korea, is created right here in the tea processing room of Dolsongi Tea Garden. The masters of OSULLOC gather together every April at the production room of the Dolsongi Tea Garden and look at the signboard of Great Sulloc Tea, bearing in mind their mission as Global Tea Value Innovators.

 In April with many sunny and clear days, you can see Halla Mountain toward the north and Gapado Island and Marado Island at the southernmost part of Korea, all at a glance from the top of the Dolsongi Tea Garden.
Come over to check out the Dolsongi Tea Garden, the secret place of OSULLOC, in a season when you can smell the scent of spring.