Toshihiro: Lastly, we want to take some time to talk to you about the future.

Tadakatsu: Why was the Olive Terrace created in the first place?

Toshihiro: Our father created a company called Shodoshima Healthy Land, focused on olive-based cosmetics. The first product he created was Suntan Oil. With input from author and kimono designer Chiyo Uno, he developed an oil treatment that became central to the Shodoshima cosmetics line Olive Grove because olives have the power to beautify both body and soul. We hope you will rely on the power of Olive Grove to help maintain your health, and that you will feel the elegance and beauty generated from the olives both internally and externally. We also hope to create a true “healthy land” that you can experience throughout your whole body. When I asked for advice from our father about developing this, he surprised me by bringing out an old journal with a blueprint. I guess he also had a vision of a “healthy land.”

Tadakatsu: That was very surprising. He would often say things like, “I didn’t plant olives here for it to become a desert island.”

Toshihiro: Oh, yeah. I mean, we don’t want Shodoshima to become a desert island, so in that sense, olives bring economic growth and jobs for the people, but they also create a space for people to gather.

Tadakatsu: In other words, we want to host people here on the island.

Toshihiro: The Yagyu Family all live here amongst the olives. Imagine the feeling of climbing up the slope to the blue sky, and feeling your heart open when you see the rock that looks like a thumbs up, the evergreen trees, the silver sea. That's what we want you to experience.

Tadakatsu: How do you want people to spend their time here at the Millennium Olive Terrace?

Toshihiro: For example, one day in the middle of the night when everyone else is sleeping, go to see the Millennium Olive Tree. Or, when opening the curtain of your room to the sprawling scenery of the ocean, you suddenly feel drawn out onto the deck before deciding to take a walk to the beach. If the timing is right, you may decide to participate in the harvest festival. These are some of the things I would love for our guests to experience.

Tadakatsu: Here is what I imagine. One day, a parent and child are walking along with the sun and Seto Inland Sea in the background. The child turns to the parent and points towards an olive leaf and says, “Look! An olive!” The parent lovingly replies, “Yes, it’s an olive.” Naturally, they grow curious, and, while examining the olive leaf, they discover the back of the leaves are silver. The next day, it rains, and the olive trees all start to sparkle as the leaves turn over to absorb the water. They learn at this moment that olives aren’t just plants, but they have a natural elegance and flexibility. They also discover just how powerful this olive tree, which has lived for a thousand years, actually is.

Toshihiro: That sounds lovely as well. We hope that through connecting with everyone here today, this can become a place for you all to come back to. We want to become more than just a community space, but a core space. To the point where you want to come back to this place, where you want to see us again. You happen to come across an olive tree and then decide to come to Shodoshima. Rather than it just being a one-time thing where you want to have a quick recharge and explore nature, it could gradually become a fundamental part of your lifestyle.

Tadakatsu: We hope you can think of Shodoshima and the Seto Inland Sea as a set. When you have sake, you don’t just think of the drink, but the story behind it. We hope this is the case with olives for you as well, as if you are tasting the landscape and stories that lie within. The beauty of the scattered islands in the Seto Island Sea, the elegance that surrounds the island. When your skin is starting to feel a bit dry, you think of olive oil.

We talked about a lot of different things, but we hope you take the beauty and comfort that the Millennium Olive Tree and the Seto Inland Sea have provided you back home with you today. At the Millennium Olive Terrace, you can stay in a cabin and relax in the Olive Salon. And we are also planning to build a sauna and continue to consistently evolve.

Toshihiro: We hope that along this journey, our circle of people who met under the Millennium Olive Tree will connect and become a family that will expand this grove together.