Chen Huaiyuan founded Jia Mu Tang Tea Shop in 1989 and went to Yunnan in 1993 to participate in the International Pu’er Tea Symposium, and immediately started importing and sharing well-known old Pu’er tea from Hong Kong.
“At that time, in order to understand Pu’er tea more clearly, I went deep into the core of the six major Pu’er tea mountains to explore and search.”
For more than 30 years, he has been in and out of the six major tea mountains to learn about the manufacturing process of Pu’er tea, visited the tea masters, and at the same time, through the camera, he has made a complete record of the hometown of Pu’er tea.
The 1970s and particularly the 1980s and 1990s saw a sharp increase of Pu’er production and the widespread use of pesticide, fertiliser and leaves from small bushes in plantations. He hopes that through his persistent work and inheritance, he can restore the past style of Pu’er, which is full of vitality and timeless.
Chen Huaiyuan visited many Yiwu tea masters, and learned that the natural methods of production of hand-made tea and subsequent storage of Pu’er can achieve the real profound aged flavour (chen xiang), and established the Jiamutang Tea Factory Chen Yuan Hao Tea House.
Over the last 30 years, he has won many prize and awards, and is likely the most influential person in the renaissance of old-style Pu’er and further development of “100% pure ancient tree” (gushu) Pu’er.
Today, the Pu’er tea area in Yunnan has flourished, and the lives of tea farmers in every family have been greatly improved. The local villagers are especially grateful to Chen Huaiyuan for his years of cultivation of Pu’er tea. Chen Huaiyuan lives in Yiwu for over 10 months a year, rarely staying in native Taiwan, to fully dedicate himself to his craft.
His Pu’er production, under the Chen YuanHao brand, is among or possibly the most well respected and regarded in the world, due to impeccable authenticity, innovative artisanal pain-staking production methods and over 20 years of creating teas that have set a new higher standard in Pu’er quality over and over.