British Columbia’s capital abounds with tea services and purveyors.
Located on Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Victoria was long famous among tourists for all things British, from quaint pubs with dartboards, cask ales, and the Union Jack to shoppes where one could acquire woolens, tea cozies, and Burleigh pottery. The Bard & Banker and Irish Times pubs still stand on Government Street; however, British Columbia’s capital has evolved into a cosmopolitan urban hub featuring eclectic cuisine, made-in-BC clothing boutiques, and artisanal craft beer and spirits.
Fortunately, Victoria’s vibrant tea culture, a fine milieu of traditional tea services and inspired new purveyors, continues to thrive. Stir Murchie’s Tea & Coffee’s storied history into the pot, and it becomes clear why Victoria resides among the most dynamic tea destinations in the world.
721 Government Street • Victoria, BC V8W 1W5
A framed, vintage Empress Hotel menu hanging on the newly refurbished Gold Floor lists, for 50 cents, “Assorted Sandwiches; Empress Cake; Tea.” The 60 cents option adds “Hot Biscuits, Devonshire Cream, Jam.”
The Empress remains one of the Canadian Pacific Railway’s most iconic monoliths, a castle of sorts hovering over the picturesque Inner Harbour. Afternoon tea here adds an ornate slant to the signature property, a glorious repast set in the elegant Lobby Lounge since the grand dame opened on January 20, 1908.
The Champagne Tea commences with a toast of Laurent-Perrier Champagne, followed by teapots that may be filled with a rare Golden Pu-Erh or the Sri Lanka and Kenya-based Empress Blend tea, among 18 tea and tisane varieties. No pods or tea dust here. Fairmont hotels take tea seriously, serving the Ontario-based Metropolitan Tea Company’s Lot 35 loose tea in its restaurants and in the Fairmont Gold Lounge.
The three-tiered tray is festooned with smoked sockeye salmon with caper berries and citrus-smoked crème fraîche and a grandfather ham éclair, among other delectable savory and sweet morsels. To understand the tradition here, consider the same Scone Master has prepared the Empress raisin scones for more than four decades!
When settled beside the Empress fire, as time’s ineluctable march pauses, one may find oneself quoting Henry James, who wrote, “There are few hours more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony of afternoon tea.”
The Empress Afternoon Tea is served by reservation Monday to Friday and Sunday, 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., and Saturday 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Murchie’s Fine Tea & Coffee
1110 Government Street • Victoria, BC V8W 1Y2
As a boy, John Murchie delivered Melrose’s Scottish tea to Queen Victoria during her Balmoral Castle residence. A Scottish tea expert, he immigrated to Victoria in Canada, where he witnessed the cultural, racial, and physical divide between the British and Chinese settlers who occupied respective sides of the Johnson Street Ravine. John launched his eponymous company in 1894 after successfully blending Chinese green tea with English black tea, thus bridging the cultural gap through bold blending.
The Government Street institution had fallen on hard times by 2007, when Victoria investors, led by managing director Grant Kuebler, purchased the company as a labor of love given Murchie’s legacy.
“The quality of Murchie’s tea had diminished significantly,” Grant says, seated inside Murchie’s bustling flagship café. “We weren’t tea people but were fortunate when experts like John Harney lent their wisdom to right the Murchie’s brand.”
Murchie’s thrives today with more than 130 teas and tisanes available online and a devoted customer base, of which Americans comprise 37 percent. Favorites include Government Street and No. 10, two of more than 15 black-green blends on offer. Earl’s Gold is also a top-selling cup of Assam, Keemun, and Yunnan with a touch of bergamot. 1894 remains very much the same tea 135 years after John Murchie created it.
No trip to Murchie’s is complete without a pause next door inside Munro’s Books. Co-founded by the late Nobel laureate Alice Munro, the 63-year-old literary institution, with its vaulted ceilings, recommended reads, and comfy chairs, evokes everything an independent bookstore should be.
Murchie’s Fine Tea & Coffee is open daily, 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Afternoon tea is served Monday to Friday and Sunday, 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., and Saturday, 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Island Elixir Tea Company
720 Station Avenue #103 • Langford, BC V9B 2S1
Bree Sharratt has loved tea since sipping Red Rose tea as a young child with her grandmother. Her passion blossomed when she changed careers in 2022. Her focus on creating soulful teas with purpose exemplifies the dedication one might expect from a Stanford-educated aerospace engineer, a position she held for 18 years before shifting her life and purpose.
“Like growing and harvesting high-elevation tea,” she says, “everyone is more complex after encountering adversity.”
Located about 15 minutes outside Victoria at the Langford Station, Island Elixir Tea Company boasts more than 40 teas, including such blends as First Light, a mixture of organic FBOP Indian black teas with green maté, and Autumn Moon, derived from Ceylon black tea, osmanthus, oatstraw, and calendula, which offers “a gentle nudge to embrace the beauty of change.”
A recently certified Tea and Herbal Association of Canada Tea Sommelier, Bree offers monthly workshops that range from “Wars and Revolutions—How Tea Made the World” to “Tea from the Top of the World,” which explores Nepalese teas and culture.
Island Elixir Tea Company is open Thursday and Friday, 12:00 to 5:00 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Silk Road Tea
1624 Government Street • Victoria, BC V8W 1Z3
Established in 1992, Silk Road conveys an enlightened approach to tea, led by founder Daniela Cubelic. Located on the edge of Canada’s oldest Chinatown, the store’s Asian-inspired aesthetic produces a spa-worthy calm the moment one steps inside.
“We’re traveling through teacups to a state of being,” says Daniela, when asked why tea remains so significant here. “Tea is a nourishing ecosystem that supports Victoria’s culture.”
A conversation with Daniela, “Canada’s Tea Master,” according to the Vancouver Sun, elevates one’s understanding of tea’s power to shape daily life: a Wuyi rock oolong to restore energy, say, or a tisane infused with plum blossoms to manifest inner strength. Silk Road pours many wonderful black teas, such as the citrusy Tanzania Gold Black Tea, but it’s the tisanes that glow brightest. Daniela’s creations inspire with every cup, be it Angelwater, a “tea of serenity” shaped by spearmint, lavender, rose, elderflower, and red clover, or Philosopher’s Brew, a “tea of enlightenment” composed of lemongrass, citrus peel, rose hips, and lavender. Every tea has a story; the narratives run deep along Silk Road.
Silk Road Tea is open Thursday to Saturday, 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and Sunday 11:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Pendray Tea House
309 Belleville Street • Victoria, BC V8V 1X2
The Pendray Inn & Tea House resides on the Inner Harbour, steps away from the impressive provincial parliament building. The Victorian-style inn offers tea services on the verandah overlooking the vibrant perennial gardens when weather permits and within the light-filled dining room at other times of year. The Scottish High Tea and Tea House Afternoon Tea menus feature an impressive 24 black, green, and tisane teas, including a Cream of Earl, Iron Goddess oolong, and Gen Mai Cha, a blend of sencha green tea and roasted rice.
The Scottish tea “savouries” include Welsh rarebit, Scotch egg, maple leaf chicken pie, and aged Cheddar scones, followed by lemon tart and other petite sweets. Afternoon tea presents a smoked salmon pinwheel and other savory morsels, two scones in seasonal flavors, and a quartet of house-made pastries. Arrive early with a favorite book to take advantage of the overstuffed chairs stationed before the grand fireplace in the library.
Afternoon tea is served Monday to Thursday, 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and Friday to Saturday, 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Scottish High Tea is served Friday to Sunday, 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. Reservations are essential.
The Butchart Gardens
800 Benvenuto Avenue • Brentwood Bay, BC V8M 1J8
Gardens and tea have long shared company. Consider Jennie Butchart, who in 1912 began transforming her husband’s exhausted limestone quarry into the sublime Sunken Garden. When visitors poured in, she built a teahouse at the apex of the garden’s path, where she personally served more than 20,000 cups of tea each year. She also created a Japanese garden, an Italian garden, a rose garden, and numerous seasonal borders, transforming a 55-acre campus into Canada’s premier show garden. Today, more than 60,000 of the more than one million annual visitors partake of afternoon tea.
And what a lovely tea it is. Set in the historic Butchart home’s tile-floored and lead-windowed solarium, the tasting menu offers nine custom loose teas, including Rose Congou, Bachelor Button, a green-black blend with strawberry and bergamot, and the 100th Anniversary blend (a unique black and green tea created to celebrate the Butchart estate’s 2004 centennial). The tri-tiered tray offers signature candied ginger scones, wild British Columbia salmon, and Berryman Brothers Farm country ham–and-brie galette, among numerous other delicious locally sourced options.
Afternoon tea is served daily, 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Reservations are highly recommended. Paid admission to gardens is required to access the dining room.
The Teahouse at Abkhazi Garden
1964 Fairfield Road • Victoria, BC V8S 1H4
Abkhazi Garden unfurls the magic one feels upon discovering a secret garden in a quiet residential neighborhood. The Asian-influenced, one-acre landscape is composed of Japanese maples, small ponds, and various perennial borders. The tale behind the property is equally tantalizing, a tapestry woven together when, in 1922, 20-year-old Peggy Pemberton-Carter met a Georgian prince living in Parisian exile after the Bolshevik Revolution. World affairs, including separate wartime incarcerations, prohibited marriage until 1946. The couple soon resettled in Victoria.
Afternoon tea, located on the home’s terrace overlooking the garden in warm months, showcases eclectic antique tea settings and features a variety of Silk Road teas, including a signature Royal Abkhazi blend of black tea, bergamot, and vanilla bean essence. The tiered tray offers a house-made garden-vegetable quiche, a ham-and-Cheddar croissant, a currant scone, and other sweet treats. The Teahouse also serves Elevenses, which features a lighter menu.
The Teahouse at Abkhazi Garden is open Wednesday to Sunday, October 1 to March 31, and daily, April 1 to September 30, 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. (last seating at 3:30 p.m.). Reservations are required.
Crai S. Bower writes about a variety of topics for many publications. A Harney & Sons “Teafluencer,” he has studied, written about, and, most importantly, imbibed fine teas for more than four decades.
