At the home of koji, &LAB Tokyo teaches Japan's fermentation toolkit — koji, miso, shio-koji, amazake — as a progressive hands-on curriculum you can actually enrol in.
Chie Ando's fermentation studio in Jingumae, Shibuya, where you make koji seasonings — shio-koji, ama-koji, shoyu-koji — and then grow koji yourself over three days. Chie Ando teaches every day of it herself. Groups of one to four, tools provided, two textbooks included. It is taught in Japanese: English support is a paid extra, cheaper if you ask three months ahead, and it closes a month before the course. Every step is also sold online, so ask yourself what the room adds before you fly for it.
Three consecutive days in Chie Ando's studio in Jingumae: a day of koji seasonings, then two of growing koji yourself, which is why the course cannot be shorter. Groups of one to four. Taught in Japanese, with English support at ¥15,000 a day, or ¥12,000 if you ask three months ahead.
Facts read on the school's own pages, 7 Nov 2026.
None. A school's own certificate of the course is the most there is. · Certifying body: No formal body. A school certifies its own course; nobody certifies fermentation as a trade.
There is a real difference between a school that teaches you and a good-looking website, and too much of the internet is the second kind. Four instruments do the work, and every one of them is visible on the page you are already on.
If a place dodges these, that's your answer. It costs you nothing to ask, and it tells you everything.
This is the short version. The full method is here — the six questions, in order, for any craft anywhere.