The Way to Tea: Your Adventure Guide to San Francisco Tea Culture [Hardcover]

Jennifer Leigh Sauer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 28, 2007

The Way to Tea is a colorful, elegant, whimsical invitation to be an honored guest at America's own emerging tea culture at its epicenter -- the San Francisco Bay Area. In San Francisco, the love of art, food, community, ideas, and cultural diversity all come together to support a thriving tea culture unsurpassed in depth and diversity by any other. With more than 125 full color images, Author/Photographer Jennifer Sauer evokes the beauty, passion and joy imbued in a broad range of unique tea experiences. If you want to be awed and impressed by an austere Japanese tea ceremony, imbibe in the most elegant of British afternoon teas, compare teas and wits with a Chinese gong fu tea practitioner, or simply explore the nuances of tea and tea culture, this book will take you there. Sauer recounts her memorable experiences, profiles the exceptional "tea people" who helped provide them, and includes a tea glossary that shows readers how experts judge teas.

Editorial Reviews

From the Author

Sharing tea has for hundreds of years taken on a variety of expressions by different cultures, but there are also common threads woven into every tea culture. These "threads" include community, ritual, art, poetry, sanctuary, intimacy, and vitality. In my journey through San Francisco tea culture, I discovered that the Bay Area is uniquely situated at the heart of a newly emerging American tea culture, and that we have perhaps the highest concentration of keenly and divergently focused tea professionals in the world right here. In no other place and at no other time could such an alchemy of cultures and traditions merge into such a diverse, fun and intensely inspiring social phenomenon. I felt it was an event worthy of recording and celebrating. The Way to Tea is a creative tribute to and appraisal of an exhilarating journey through the labyrinth of San Francisco tea culture.

From the Back Cover

You are invited to the world's most eclectic tea party. You can bring a hat, a fan, a bird, a book, or a pair of white gloves. The new American tea culture has arrived, and the San Francisco Bay Area is at its core. If you want to learn more about tea culture traditions from around the world, find a wide variety of fabulous tea lounges, tearooms, tea shops and tea experts in the Bay Area, The Way to Tea is your guide.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 128 pages
• Publisher: Earth Aware Editions; First Edition edition (August 28, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1601090099
• ISBN-13: 978-1601090096
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 8.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,247,836 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars warm and insightful, December 9, 2007

By 

J. Goldstein (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Way to Tea: Your Adventure Guide to San Francisco Tea Culture (Hardcover)

Not just a traditional guide book, any lover of tea, or a reader of Okakura's The Book of Tea, would find this guide to tea indespensable. While for some it may lead to a year's worth of Bay Area teahouse exploration, for others it is a night table companion full of gorgeous photographs and insights into tea drinking. Truly, a wonderful gift for yourself or anyone who enjoys watching tea leaves unfurl in a cup.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An eye for tea, January 14, 2008

By 

Bruce Richardson "Teamaestro" (Perryville, KY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Way to Tea: Your Adventure Guide to San Francisco Tea Culture (Hardcover)

Few photographers can match Jennifer's eye for photographing tea. Her guide to tea in San Francisco is as complete a snapshot as you will find for this city that embraces both European and Asian tea traditions. The Way of Tea is a delicious feast for the eyes!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tea House in San Francisco, December 11, 2007

By 

Frederick C. Holland - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Way to Tea: Your Adventure Guide to San Francisco Tea Culture (Hardcover)

This is an excellent book with wonderful photographs and extremely well written. After reading this book I definitely want to visit San Francisco and visit some of the tea houses. Anyone would miss a great opportunity to learn more about tea and tea houses and history of tea if they do not buy this book.