TEA CULTURE 2026 Los Angeles | Mushanokoji Senke Tea Ceremony Demonstration | Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden in Pasadena | Sunday, Sept. 27, 11AM & 12:30PM
The Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden in Pasadena has recently started offering seasonal tea ceremony demonstrations at the Niko-An Teahouse with tea practitioner Yuki Wakino, who has been practicing the tea ceremony since she was twelve years old and studying with the Mushanokoji Senke school of tea for seven years.
The next tea ceremony demonstration will be held:
Sunday, September 27, 2026
11:00 a.m. and 12:30 p.m.
Ms. Wakino will give two short (45-minute) demonstrations of the matcha tea ceremony.
Each 45-minute session includes:
- A guided introduction to the tea ceremony and Japanese etiquette (otemae)
- Traditional Japanese sweets (wagashi)
- A bowl of freshly whisked matcha
Ten spaces per session, 11:00 a.m. & 12:30 p.m.
$40 per person (including $12 garden admission)
Please arrive 15 minutes early to the session.
Reserve your space at https://japanesegardenpasadena.app.neoncrm.com/np/clients/japanesegardenpasadena/event.jsp?event=4597&
The Niko-An Teahouse at the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden is one of the few places in Southern California where a Japanese tea ceremony can be experienced in the setting of a traditional teahouse and strolling garden.
The traditional Japanese tea ceremony, or chanoyu (literally, “Hot Water for Tea”), uses powdered high-quality green tea known as matcha that was first brought from China to Japan by Buddhist monks in the late 12th century.
From its roots in Japan’s Zen Buddhist temples, tea drinking spread to the residences of the nation’s warrior elite and by the 16th century crystallized into an elegant cultural pursuit that influenced almost every aspect of Japanese culture.