From Chiang Dao to your Glass
Forget everything you know about mead. Day Drinkers Collective makes spontaneously fermented honey wines that taste like the Thai jungle itself, bright, funky, and built for sunshine. Just wild honey, wild yeast, and the landscape of Northern Thailand in every bottle.
What’s Day Drinkers Collective?
Born out of a pandemic, a Tinder date, and a very good visit to a meadery in San Francisco, Pailin Wongsasuk and Will Le Masurier took one look at the wild honey orchards surrounding their home in Chiang Dao and thought: we have to try this. What started as kitchen experiments is now one of the most exciting drinks projects in Southeast Asia. Using wild honey from Northern Thailand, mountain spring water, and spontaneous wild yeast fermentation, these are honey wines built for people who think mead is for Vikings. Dry, sparkling, and funky and the total opposite of what you'd expect.
What We're Pouring.
Small-batch. Hand-bottled. Each one wild-fermented and full of Northern Thai character. Here's what's currently flowing from Chiang Dao to Hong Kong.
What Is Honey Wine?
Mead or honey wine is the oldest drink humans ever made. Before grapes, before grain, before anyone had opinions about tannins, there was honey, water, and wild yeast doing its thing. It's not beer. It's not wine. It's its own deal, and it's been having a quiet moment for about 8,000 years.
Day Drinkers makes theirs dry and sparkling, which means none of that sticky-sweet Renaissance Faire stuff you might be picturing. Think closer to a crisp natural wine, bright, a little funky, something happening on the palate, except it's made entirely from honey. Wild, local, Northern Thai honey, to be specific, mixed with mountain spring water and left alone to ferment on its own terms.
Lychee Flowers
Early Winter
Longan Blossoms
January & February
Mountain Wildflowers
All Year Round
Pailin & Will
Pitchayapak "Pailin" Wongsasuk runs production. Former cabin crew, now full-time flavour alchemist. She handles wild ferments, lacto-experiments, and fruit co-ferments. Her favourite creation: the funky, sour, unapologetically wild Funkadelic.
Will Le Masurier handles marketing, sales, and distribution. Former tour guide. Now the guy convincing Hong Kong, Singapore, and beyond that mead is for everyone.