Our Story

là lạ lá – “to be a strange leaf”

We are Q and Jimmy, friends who met in Brooklyn through a food and art and bonded over our personal histories in Việt Nam: Q was born in Nha Trang and Jimmy is first-generation Vietnamese American.

Together, we discovered our passion for how tea unites people and the earth.

là lạ lá grew out of our friendship with Vietnamese tea master Việt Hùng  Nguyên. We partner directly with tea purveyors and producers to share fine Vietnamese teas with the world. We are committed to ethical and sustainable practices.

Việt Nam is home to some of the world’s oldest tea trees. The very taste of our tea is inseparable from the high mountain soil and our local partners who harvest it. Tea gives us a chance to see deeply into how the present moment came to be.