#50
Opening Hours
Sunday: 11:00 – 18:00
Monday: 11:00 – 18:00
Tuesday: 11:00 – 18:00
Wednesday: 11:00 – 18:00
Thursday: 11:30 – 18:30
Friday: 11:00 – 18:00
Saturday: 11:00 – 18:00
What's not to miss inside?
The Shopfront
An 18th-century icon still in useTwin Chinese figures and a golden lion top the lintel—commercial theatre that’s greeted customers for three centuries.
📍 216 Strand, pediment and doorway
Mini-Museum Cases
Tea’s rise told in objectsCaddies with secret locks, early adverts and royal warrants sketch how tea moved from luxury to everyday habit.
📍 Back of the shop
Tasting Bar
Palate > packagingStaff will tune water temperature and brew time so you can taste the difference between, say, Darjeeling and Assam—or Earl Grey and its modern cousins.
📍 Rear counter
Royal Warrants Wall
Tea by appointmentFrom Queen Victoria in 1837 onwards, the warrants chart a continuous relationship with the Crown.
📍 Along the side displays
🤓 Fun Facts
Thomas Twining opened on this very spot in 1706—making it one of London’s longest-trading shops under the same brand and address.
Twinings once ran a bank: ‘Twinings Bank’ (founded 1825) later merged into Lloyds—proof that tea financed more than teatime.
The craze for locking tea caddies was practical: in the 18th century tea was so expensive that households kept it under literal lock and key.
The ‘Earl Grey’ story is murky, but Twinings created ‘Lady Grey’ in the 1990s as a lighter, citrus-forward blend for modern palates—and it stuck worldwide.
