Gawin x Nari | 01 The Heart Of Tea
How does one fall in love with tea production? Explore the journey of Gawin, a Swedish-Thai tea practitioner whose background has nothing to do with tea production but his love for tea brought him to Taiwan to meet his mentor/master, Chin-Shin, who also does not come from a heritage of tea production.
Somehow, the fate of tea brought them together, and passion was the shared value that bonded them. Gawin will share four teas that he co-produced over the course of a year, retelling his journey in Taiwan, where he slowly came to understand what tea production as a craft truly means.
As a tea lover, I long wondered what each step of tea production truly meant. Reading about it only raised more questions – I wanted to see and do it for myself. This pursuit led me to Taiwan, and suddenly, I was attending tea expos, tea gatherings, and tea markets. Countless afternoons and nights were spent drinking tea with strangers and friends. Still, I hadn’t yet learned how tea was really made.
Then fate brought me to my shifu, Chin-Shin, a young and passionate tea master who showed me what the art of tea-making really meant. People often told me, “nobody makes tea like him,” and watching him work taught me how care and intention shaped the whole process. From then on, presence at the tea gardens humbled me to realize that tea is just leaves. Everything else is us, the involvement of us humans.
Yet making tea this way is no small task. In Taiwan, it is increasingly difficult to sustain small-scale, high-quality production, and it is even harder when working with environmentally friendly methods. In this session, I bring those field experiences and observations for open discussion, and of course, the small batch teas I co-produced.
Tea Selection
- 金觀音 包種 Jin Guan Yin Baozhong
- 凍頂 烏龍 Dong Ding Wulong
- 鐵觀音 烏龍 Tie Guan Yin Wulong
- 紅韻 紅茶 Hong Yun Black Tea