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The next leg of our journey took us to us to one of the most fascinating and exciting tea estates I have ever been to. Idalgashinna began life as a tea estate in 1984. It quickly became one of the pioneers of organic tea farming and was certified Organic back in 1989. This pioneering nature was further exemplified by it being categorised as Biodynamic since 1999. More on what this means exactly later. Further to this it has acted under the Fairtrade banner since 1992. 274 hectares of estate producing around 200 tonnes of some of the finest tea in Sri Lankan each...

On a quiet evening a few weeks ago I was sitting in the Tea House doing some paperwork and the phone rang.  At this time of night a call is usually family or friends but this time it happened to be a fellow tea enthusiast who had visited the Tea House & taken tea with us.  Since starting our business [& in my previous business life] we have had to make many speculative calls to growers, makers & tea experts seeking advice, help or just the chance for discussion around topics we were trying to understand so I recognised the tone...

Several days into our trip we headed away from the coast towards Deniyaya.  At Comins we always talk about connection and many of our new contacts come through people we meet who offer personal recommendations that we then follow up on our trips.  As we head off towards these new gardens we never know what we will find.  In this case Michelle had met with the wonderful team from the Sri Lankan tea board at an event with the Guild of Fine Food in London earlier this year.  On sharing our story, our approach to sourcing and the types of people we...

On arriving in Shanghai we took a car to the main railway station to wait for our train to Fuding where I was keen to continue my education & understanding of White Tea.  Many of you will have tasted White tea at the Tea House - put in simple terms it is a lightly oxidised tea from the buds and leaves of the Camellia Sinensis plant and Fujian province and in particular the hilly Jianyang, Fuding and Songxi  counties are the centre of white tea production in China.   My guide also talked to me about white tea production in Zhenghe County which is better...

This week we are really excited to be joining the team from Benchmark Furniture at Clerkenwell design week.  Benchmark is led by Sean Sutcliffe who, on the recommendation of Sam from Hole & Corner magazine, [check out this beautiful publication if you have not come across it already....] came into our Tea House one day.  We chatted and discovered that their Dorset Workshop is just up the road.  From here we shared tea and have been privileged to visit and learn more about this wonderful British business.  You can read more about Benchmark Furniture on their website where Sean, his team and the beautiful...