Kaiseki & Onsen: Japan’s Most Exclusive Ryokan Experiences

Gora Kadan occupies the former summer villa of the Kan’in-no-miya imperial family, and this provenance infuses every aspect of the experience. The 39 rooms and suites are spread across manicured gardens that date to the Muromachi period, each with a private onsen fed by Hakone’s mineral-rich volcanic springs.

The Bettei Suite Akatsuki (¥205,000 per person/night) is the property’s crown: a standalone pavilion with its own garden, open-air bath, and tatami living space that feels less like a hotel room and more like a private estate. The Bettei Suite Akebono (¥141,500 per person/night) offers a similar intimacy at a slightly gentler price point, with a cypress bath overlooking a private moss garden.

The kaiseki here is extraordinary—a nightly progression that draws on Hakone’s mountain ingredients and Sagami Bay’s seafood, presented on ceramics that are themselves museum pieces. The communal onsen, fed by three distinct spring sources, includes an open-air bath carved into the mountainside where you soak beneath maple canopy that ignites crimson in autumn.

Asaba is the ryokan that other ryokan owners visit when they want to remember why they entered this profession. Founded in 1675, with only 17 rooms, it represents the most distilled expression of the form: every room has a private hot spring bath, the 1,983m² garden centres on a tranquil pond, and the service is so intuitive that requests feel redundant.

The defining feature is the Noh stage—a traditional performance platform that appears to float on the garden pond, dating to the Meiji period. Regular Noh performances transform the garden into an open-air theatre, the ancient masks and robes reflected in the still water as the drama unfolds. It is, without exaggeration, one of the most beautiful performance spaces in Japan.

Kaiseki at Asaba is served in four exclusive dining rooms, each seating no more than a handful of guests. The cuisine emphasises Izu Peninsula ingredients—wasabi grown in mountain streams, local Kinmedai (golden-eye snapper), mountain vegetables foraged from surrounding forests. Rates range from ¥90,000 to ¥180,000 per person per night. Adults only (guests must be 6+).

Amanemu is what happens when Aman’s philosophy of serene minimalism meets the Japanese ryokan tradition. The name combines “Aman” (peace) with “nemu” (joy), and the 24 suites and villas—each with private onsen baths fed by the resort’s own thermal spring—deliver on both promises.

Set within Ise-Shima National Park on the Kii Peninsula, the property overlooks Ago Bay, famous for its pearl cultivation (Mikimoto’s original pearl farm is nearby). The architecture draws on traditional Japanese forms—low-slung pavilions, sliding shoji screens, natural timber and stone—but the spaces are unmistakably Aman: generous, uncluttered, designed to frame the landscape rather than compete with it.

Experiences include private pearl diving with local ama divers (a tradition spanning 3,000 years), visits to the Ise Grand Shrine (Japan’s most sacred Shinto site, rebuilt every 20 years), and a 2,000m² spa with thermal bathing circuits. Rates from approximately ¥250,000+ per night ($1,685–$1,941). Two-night minimum. Helicopter access available from Osaka or Nagoya.

The name means “without equal,” and among Japan’s contemporary ryokans, Beniya Mukayu justifies the claim. Just 16 rooms, each with a private open-air bath overlooking forested ravines, in a property that represents the most sophisticated marriage of traditional ryokan culture and modern design sensibility.

The architecture is a revelation: clean lines and floor-to-ceiling glass bring the forest inside, while natural materials—local stone, aged timber, handmade washi paper—root the spaces in their Ishikawa context. The Byakuroku Terrace Suite (¥114,950 per person/night) offers an expansive terrace with an open-air hinoki cypress bath that feels suspended in the forest canopy.

The onsen town of Yamashiro, one of Japan’s oldest hot spring settlements, surrounds the property. Guests can explore its traditional public bathhouses and ceramics studios. Kanazawa—home to Kenroku-en garden and the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art—is just 30 minutes away, making Beniya Mukayu an ideal pairing with one of Japan’s most culturally rich cities.

The name translates as “to sit and forget amongst the woods,” and Zaborin delivers on this promise with 15 private villas hidden in Hanazono’s birch and oak forest. Each villa features both an indoor and outdoor onsen, fed by the property’s own free-flowing volcanic spring—no recycled water, no additives, just mineral-rich thermal water at source.

In winter, Zaborin becomes a ski lodge of extraordinary refinement: the forest turns white, the outdoor onsen steam rises against snow-laden branches, and Niseko’s legendary powder is minutes away. In summer, the landscape transforms into rolling green, with hiking, cycling, and rafting replacing the skis.

The “Kita Kaiseki” cuisine is Zaborin’s culinary signature—a Hokkaido interpretation of the traditional form that emphasises the island’s exceptional seafood (uni, crab, scallops from Shakotan), dairy (Hokkaido produces Japan’s finest), and mountain ingredients. At approximately $1,252 per night, it represents remarkable value in the ultra-luxury ryokan category. Sapporo is approximately 2 hours by car.

The journey begins at Togetsukyo Bridge, where a private boat carries you upriver through Arashiyama’s bamboo-lined gorge to a property that has been welcoming guests since the Heian period. The 25 rooms occupy a series of traditional machiya-style buildings that cascade down the hillside above the Oi River, each oriented to frame the gorge’s dramatic seasonal transformations.

Hostinoya’s genius is in distilling the ryokan experience for contemporary travellers while maintaining absolute authenticity. Morning meditation sessions, incense-making workshops, and sake-tasting evenings complement the architectural beauty. The boat-only access creates a psychological threshold—the sense of leaving the modern world behind as you glide upriver.

Two-night minimum stay at approximately ¥100,000 per person per night. The property’s relationship with the river is total: the exclusive houseboat “Hisui” offers private dinner cruises through the gorge, and the summer cormorant fishing viewing from the water is one of Kyoto’s most evocative experiences.

On a tiny coral island 10 minutes by boat from Ishigaki, Hoshinoya Taketomi Island reimagines the ryokan concept through the lens of Ryukyu culture—the unique civilisation of Japan’s subtropical southern islands. Traditional red-tile villas line crushed coral pathways, behind fossilised limestone walls draped in bougainvillea.

This is not the Japan of tatami and shoji screens. This is tropical Japan: turquoise waters, water buffalo plodding through sandy streets, nights illuminated by southern constellations invisible from the mainland. The villas blend Okinawan architectural tradition with contemporary comfort, and the spa programmes draw on Ryukyu wellness traditions rather than mainland onsen culture.

From ¥112,000 per room; wellness packages from ¥155,000 per person. The dining showcases Okinawan ingredients—goya, purple sweet potato, umibudo (sea grape), Ishigaki beef—in preparations that honour both kaiseki structure and Ryukyu culinary identity. The island’s population of just over 300 ensures an intimacy that feels closer to a private island than a hotel.