The Tea Trade in Canton, 1769–1869 Conference

There was a time when the world passed through a port.

For a century, from 1769 to 1869, Canton was one of the beating hearts of the world tea trade. A city facing the sea, fragrant warehouses, bales of leaves pressed, rolled, twisted, sorted, and named. Shipments leaving the Chinese shores to reach European tables, and with them, a new, almost insatiable thirst.

This conference proposes to trace the invisible current linking Canton to European markets. How did growing demand transform tea itself? How did Western expectations influence the proliferation of leaf shapes and colors, the codification of categories, and the expansion of plantations?

Because tea is not just a plant. It is also an answer. An answer to a taste, to a trend, to a desire for something different.