Why it belongs in ORBIS
Ryan and his partner Mei-Hsin, both originally from Taiwan and Mei-Hsin a resident of Argentina for more than thirty years, founded Pei Chen Tea Palace in Buenos Aires's Belgrano neighborhood in 2012 as a house dedicated specifically to Asian tea culture, distinct from the city's more common European-style tea rooms.
Ryan and his partner Mei-Hsin, both originally from Taiwan and Mei-Hsin a resident of Argentina for more than thirty years, founded Pei Chen Tea Palace in Buenos Aires's Belgrano neighborhood in 2012 as a house dedicated specifically to Asian tea culture, distinct from the city's more common European-style tea rooms. The shop sits a short distance from Barrio Chino and runs an in-house academy — an e-learning platform with more than fifteen courses built around Zhejiang University's tea-tasting curriculum, alongside a free YouTube course on tea fundamentals.
Beyond retail, Pei Chen has hosted visiting Chinese tea masters running hands-on workshops as far afield as Oberá, Argentina, and Huayopata, Peru, extending its teaching program well past its own Olazábal Street storefront.
In a city where afternoon tea usually means a European-style salon, Pei Chen Tea Palace stands apart as a house built specifically around Asian tea ceremony and sourcing, run by founders teaching a curriculum drawn directly from a Chinese university's own program.