White tea's history

Like many other teas, white originated from the Fu Jian are of southern China, more particularly  from the Fu Ding area.

There is a tea plant unique to this area called ‘Fu Ding Da Bai Cha’ (Fu Ding big white tea) whose leaves are characterized by being strong with needle shaped tips when unfolded, and having a covering of white fur.

White tea has a recorded history of around 1000 years, which is relatively short compare to other Chinese teas such as green and Oolong teas (some with a recorded history of more than 2000 years).

There have been  debates arguing for a longer period to white tea's history, some insisting it is actually one of the earliest Chinese teas. The line of argument for this claim centres on the relatively simple drying process used in white tea production which aligns with processes first used in tea production as tea gained in popularity as a beveridge. ie people started preserving fresh tea leaves for later use by simple methods such as drying.

• This formed the basic process of white tea making.
• Subsequently, various additional steps, skills and tea making methods aumented this first stage to eventually arrive at production techniques that cover all of today's 6 major tea categories and distinctions within each (ie  many teas in  in each class : more than 300 hundred in green tea category alone!). 

White tea production is still very much limited to certain pocket areas of the Fujian region of China.

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