The Shan-Tea Art Shanty Project

 

Oolong John Silver

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A silk-smuggling, pirate birthed on a vessel en-route to Rotterdam from Singapore, Oolong John's sea legs are rarely grounded.  Oolong's early years were spent as a stowaway, sailing stormy seas around the globe. Oolong's rough and tumble ways were flipped when he sipped his first drop of fine tea, steeped by one Sir Earl Grey Beard, on board the tea ship Dartmouth on its voyage to the Boston Harbour in 1773.  As the divinely brewed elixir touched Silver's sharp tongue,  a lifetime of  swindling and swash buckling was tossed overboard.  Oolong adopted a deeply brewed , committing to the proliferation of public enjoyment of tea.

Earl Grey Beard

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Born into a long line of noble botanists on the sequestered  Shetland Island of Yell, the young Earl spent his childhood scouring the cliffs surrounding  Loudmoughth Manor, perched high on a teetering bluff overlooking the northern Atlantic.  A restless youngster, Grey Beard was known to commonly cause commotion in his decorous court.
After a particularly scandalous clash with his arch nemesis the Baron von Biscuit over Biscuit's betrothed Lady Red Rose, the Yell court reached a consensus to banish Grey Beard.  No stranger to scandal, the ruling didn't much bother the turbulent Earl, as he hopped aboard the tea trading vessel Dartmouth, en route to American shores.  Once on board, the ship's captain found the Earl's concocted courtly manners a welcome change from the boisterous behaviours of surrounding sailors and Grey-Beard
soon earned his place as first mate, before meeting  the obstreperous stowaway, Oolong John.  It was from this captain Ceylon, over a cup of his finest captain's blend tea, that the young Earl first heard tell of a brewed beverage so potent, it promised eternal life.  This so called elixir of immortality  quickly became his muse and the driving force behind a lifetime search for all manners of tea. 

Darjeeling Clementine

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Once a southern country belle from South Carolina, Darjeeling Clementine was hostess to elaborate costume tea parties. At one of these steamy social engagements she declared “This flower is wilting!” and dreamed of a cool brewed refreshment. Hearing her desire, the Indian tea merchant Assam Iam proposed that together they set forth for the discovery of ice tea. Their ill-fated love affair led Darjeeling Clementine a thousand miles from home. Right from the onset, their expedition was struck with murderous tragedy. Now Darjeeling wears the shorn beard of her dead lover as she ventures to the frozen north to discover ice tea and map a trading route with the Shan-tea.

Lady Red Rose

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Lady Red Rose inexplicably washed ashore to the inland lakes of Minnesota from the balmy beaches of South Florida. Armed only with a map, a miraculously blooming red rose, and an empty teacup, she ventured off into the unfamiliar territory. 

The landscape's emptiness became oppressive, bearing down on the lone traveller. At just that moment, a small animal - one with the strength of a bison, but the demeanor of a beloved kitten - crossed Lady Red Rose's path. The two sized each other up, realized neither was really that big anyways, and became instant friends.

Since that day Lady Red Rose has become the protector of the small animal and her family, connecting the human world to the animal world of this strange frozen terrain, all over a cup of tea. She can be found in the Arctic Pet Shop January 23 and 24, 2010.

Lapsang Souchong Teasong

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Lord Lipton L'Argent

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