Bronze plaque № 59711

The Tea Building. This plaque commemorates 350 years of the tea industry in the City of London. The industry was spread over Plantation House (now Plantation Place), Mincing Lane, Fenchurch Street, Great Tower Street, Leadenhall Street, St. Katharine Docks and Commodity Quay. It all began with the British East Indian Company who had a monopoly over tea from China & India and at one point, the City of London controlled over 85% of the World’s tea trade. Discovered in China in 2727 BC tea, known as ‘Green Gold’ was traded in ‘tea lanes’ and ‘streets of tea’. Tea auctions commenced in the City on 11 March 1679 initially with the import of tea from China, followed by India, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Africa to name just a few. From that point on, the tea auctions continued with the final auction on 29 June 1998. Initially the auction was housed at the East India House at Leadenhall Street (1680 – 1835), followed by the Commercial Salerooms on Mincing Lane (1836 – 1935) before peaking at Plantation House (1936 – 1970). The auctions then moved to Sir John Lyon House (1971 – 1990) and finally at The London Chamber of Commerce (1990 -1998). There were 126 tea growing companies worldwide in 1897, which increase to 341 in 1933 and then to 239 in 1969. In London there were 75 tea brokers, 44 tea warehouses and it is estimated there were 20,000 tea merchants across the UK. In 1897 the investment in tea in just India and Ceylon was £35m! The Tea Building was built in 1931-33 for the iconic Lipton brand of Allied Foods Ltd. Originally the building was built as a bacon factory but was then used to pack tea for much of its life. The building had offices on the ground floor along with the checking and despatch department. On the top floor was Lipton’s Tasting and Blending Room. Several buildings were merged together and, from the late 1930s, it was used to pack tea. Today Lipton is a household name across the world. Sir Thomas Lipton, who entered the tea trade in 1889, coined the globally recognised slogan “Direct from the Tea Gardens to the Teapot”.

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