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March 2024 by Laura Lefevre
We had the cottage tea vegetarian version and we loved every single bite of it! Very cute tea shop!
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March 2024 by Jessica Charvat
This place is such a charmer! Its so cute and full of all things tea. Don't forget to go to the back and up the stairs to go so even more items. The teas are all delicious and the ladies work so hard her. Also, if you are going to do an afternoon tea be sure to make reservations ahead of time. No walk ins allowed.
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March 2024 by Sue Royal
We've been shopping and having tea/lunch at the Julian Tea and Cottage Arts for over 20 years. The food is yummy, and there's a good selection of merchandise.
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March 2024 by Laura G.
Hidden behind the main drag in Julian, is this enchanting tea house. The Julian tea and cottage is a converted home. It's not truly a restaurant as you cannot just drop in and have tea at any time. You must make reservations and they have certain seating times that are listed. The hostesses were kind enough to make an accommodation for us, as we did not know this, and took us a half an hour early for their 1 o'clock seating. We were served the full tea which included a delicious scone with cream and jam, finger sandwiches, dessert, and our choice of tea. My girlfriend's husband had discovered Yorkshire Gold at this tea house many many years ago, and it is our favorite. They still serve it! The cuisine was scrumptious. This was one of the best scones I've ever had, warm, flaky, moist, and not too dry as I've experienced at other places recently. It was served with cream and lemon curd. The sandwiches were delightful, both double-sided sandwiches, and also open faced, chicken salad, raisin bread, and cream cheese, egg salad. For February they were having a special Valentines tea as well. I'm assuming during other holiday seasons, they would have other holiday themed teas available for purchase. Currently they have one available for four days during March Irish themed for St. Patrick's Day. The dining room areas are warm and intimate. The rooms are decorated in a Victorian style, crammed, full of romantic, tea, goodies, racks with tea cups, hanging on the walls, tea, towels, teapots lining the top of a shelf around the ceiling. There are lace curtains, tall, narrow windows typical of a Victorian cottage. On our rainy day adventure, it was delightful to be able to sit and have a hot pot of tea with all of the delicious accoutrements. While sitting sipping tea and dining, we had plenty of time to observe the environment to decide we loved the tea racks with dishes on them, and my girlfriend fell in love with a tea serving tray, a teapot, and a tea cozy! So we definitely had shopping we needed to do. This tea cottage is jampacked with all kinds of goodies to shop for. Every room is a different theme and there is an upstairs to shop in as well. There are cards and stationary. There are teapots galore, all different sizes, shapes and colors. There are tea, trays, and tea cozies from floral to animals, elegant and funky novelty. There is one whole room set aside just for the actual tea leaves. Bulk tea in packages. I found some Irish breakfast which I had not found in bulk anywhere in quite some. I bought 4 ounces of that and it is just delicious. There were also many brands of tea in teabags, boxed teas, tins of teas. There are all sorts of cooking utensils, teaspoons with delightful little decorations, like teapots and flowers. Upstairs, there are some ready to wear items like gloves, hats, scarves, and also aprons, tea, towels, potholders, and other kitchen, soft furnishings. There was a room full of cooking utensils and equipment for you to cook with and make your own tea goodies along with books, cookbooks, books about the history of tea, etc. This place has tea items to warm your heart, tickle your fancy,and is the best equipped tea House I have ever experienced. A welcome reprieve during a cold rainy day. Definitely plan ahead and get one of the seating times for this delicious tea extravaganza!
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December 2023 by PTG
Wide variety of teas, pleasant atmosphere. A bit crowded though.
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December 2023 by Aurora Nava
My boyfriend surprised me with reservations on our trip to Julian and it was the highlight of the day! The staff were kind enough to accommodate my boyfriend's preferences ahead of time, as he cannot eat most cheeses, and the service was amazing!The mini eggnog cheesecakes were my favorite and they have a huge selection of teas and related goods you can buy as well! Really amazing and friendly service, I can't recommend them enough!Dietary restrictions: If you call ahead, they are willing to accommodate dietary needs!
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December 2023 by Brandy B.
My family and I had the pleasure of enjoying the Victorian Christmas tea here. The tea cottage was so cozy! The Christmas tea cups and tea pots were so beautiful that it all just felt so festive. The food was so delicious! The. Scone. The scone was so light and paired perfectly with the cream and curd. Would 100% come here again!
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December 2023 by Yang Chen
I rarely write negative reviews, but hope this post provides constructive feedback.My boyfriend and I came to Julian Tea and Cottage Arts and ordered the Afternoon Tea (priced at $28/person) after calling ahead. The tea shop is super cute and unique, decorations and music create a wonderful ambiance to go with the tea. Our main issues with the tea shop had to do with the service.We were served by a very young girl (in her teens) who explained to us that our Afternoon Tea would come with 3 rounds of snacks (finger sandwiches, scones and jam, and finally a house desert) as well as one bottomless pot which we could choose different teas. If we didn't like the particular tea we chose, we were told we could get another kind. This all sounded great until after the first round of tea and finger sandwiches. Our hostess delivered the scones and jam as well as our check and then left the table promptly, without asking for our next tea selection (and before the last round of deserts) or explaining why we were brought the check so early. Our pot and teacups had already been well emptied by then. I was confused by this as we were supposed to have bottomless tea. We went up and let them know our second tea choice. They said, no problem, they would bring it to our table. Here we waited for the second pot for at least fifteen minutes until we had to go up and ask again. Finally, our hostess brought out our second tea pot, which, to our disappointment wasn't even filled up all the way. I asked again if we could have a third pot (this was supposed to be bottomless tea), and our hostess replied with the fact that they were running out of hot water and unfortunately wouldn't be able to get us any more tea... I had suspected by then that they were starting to already running out of hot water after our first tea pot, which is why we were brought the check so early.To have a tea shop and offer bottomless tea yet run out of hot water (over 40 minutes before closing) seemed quite ridiculous. This was compounded by the steep price point (I was okay with this to start with given the unique experience and what was being offered seemed fair on paper). At the end of 1.5 hours, we paid $62 for basically one and a half pots of tea plus some snacks and were only asked about our tea choice once. I fully support hiring young people to work in businesses, but hope that they would at least be reasonably well trained. For the price point they are charging and the cost of the goods itself (mid to higher end tea bags found at any grocery store plus small homemade treats), I think they could afford to expend a few more dollars to enhance the quality and add more care into the service. They display hundreds of teas on the walls of the shop, but only have a menu of about ~20 tea choices. Yes, most of the reviews have had great experiences and I'd bet too we would have, maybe on a different day and with a different hostess. I personally will not be returning on the principle being a tea shop and running out of hot water.
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November 2023 by Alyssa N.
A must visit!! We visited Julian for the first time and I definitely wanted to check this shop out. Note: it's a block behind the main shops of Julian, near residential buildings. The cutest shop ever. So many variations of tea, tea tools, kitchenware, and other miscellaneous items!! I bought 2 types of tea and a mini mirror and was given a freebie of tea bags. Service is great-- they offered tea samples and made sure we were okay browsing. They also have a tea party room in the front where folks can drink and eat from their menu. I didn't do this, but definitely will if I get the chance in the future :)
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November 2023 by Tiana M.
Love the tea room experience. Such a nice place to be during the autumn holidays especially when it's windy. I tried the Afternoon Tea package and it was great. I'll definitely come back here again when I'm in Julian.
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November 2023 by Yang C.
I rarely write negative reviews, but hope this post provides constructive feedback. My boyfriend and I came to Julian Tea and Cottage Arts and ordered the Afternoon Tea (priced at $28/person) after calling ahead. The tea shop is super cute and unique, decorations and music create a wonderful ambiance to go with the tea. Our main issues with the tea shop had to do with the service. We were served by a very young girl (in her teens) who explained to us that our Afternoon Tea would come with 3 rounds of snacks (finger sandwiches, scones and jam, and finally a house desert) as well as one bottomless pot which we could choose different teas. If we didn't like the particular tea we chose, we were told we could get another kind. This all sounded great until after the first round of tea and finger sandwiches. Our hostess delivered the scones and jam as well as our check and then left the table promptly, without asking for our next tea selection (and before the last round of deserts) or explaining why we were brought the check so early. Our pot and teacups had already been well emptied by then. I was confused by this as we were supposed to have bottomless tea. We went up and let them know our second tea choice. They said, no problem, they would bring it to our table. Here we waited for the second pot for at least fifteen minutes until we had to go up and ask again. Finally, our hostess brought out our second tea pot, which, to our disappointment wasn't even filled up all the way. I asked again if we could have a third pot (this was supposed to be bottomless tea), and our hostess replied with the fact that they were running out of hot water and unfortunately wouldn't be able to get us any more tea... I had suspected by then that they were starting to already running out of hot water after our first tea pot, which is why we were brought the check so early. To have a tea shop and offer bottomless tea yet run out of hot water (over 40 minutes before closing) seemed quite ridiculous. This was compounded by the steep price point (I was okay with this to start with given the unique experience and what was being offered seemed fair on paper). At the end of 1.5 hours, we paid $62 for basically one and a half pots of tea plus some snacks and were only asked about our tea choice once. I fully support hiring young people to work in businesses, but hope that they would at least be reasonably well trained. For the price point they are charging and the cost of the goods itself (mid to higher end tea bags found at any grocery store plus small homemade treats), I think they could afford to expend a few more dollars to enhance the quality and add more care into the service. They display around 100+ teas on the walls of the shop, but only have a menu of about ~20 tea choices. Yes, most of the reviews have had great experiences and I'd bet too we would have, maybe on a different day and with a different hostess. I personally will not be returning on the principle of them being a tea shop and running out of hot water.
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October 2023 by Dinah Childress
The shop overall is amazing a huge selection of teas . The food was not good . I felt it could have been better . The tea was good . Stick with the tea alone and you will be happy .
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October 2023 by Sara K.
We had a lovely time here! We emailed to make a reservation about a week in advance since it was a holiday weekend. We were given a couple of times to choose from and were able to specify outdoor seating since we would be bringing our small dog in a backpack. We weren't sure whether to do the tea for two or two individual teas, but we went with the tea for two, thinking that if it wasn't that filling we could still get pie or whatever in town. The outdoor space isn't as cute as the indoor one, but it was very nice. We got to choose our teas and then we received finger sandwiches. We asked for our tea to be vegetarian, so we each had 4 different sandwiches--I think cheddar baguette, croissant with pesto and cheese, cucumber, and one other. There was also a bowl of fruit. Then we had the second course which consisted of a scone and an almond shortbread cookie each. The scones were fantastic and came with delicious lemon curd, clotted cream, and jam. I absolutely loved the shortbread too. Everything was beautifully presented. This wasn't an overly filling meal but was just the right amount for me. We enjoyed looking at the shop inside afterward. Overall I had a wonderful experience and I think the tea for two is just right and a good value.
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October 2023 by Peter van de Water
The largest variety in tea and related products I have seen in years. Friendly staff.
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October 2023 by Amber Capers
I was actually really,really disappointed l, I had read all these great reviews and decided to take my mom for her Birthday! We talked about it all week and were excited! They were extremely disorganized, and the tea was so cold. Didn't even offer cream or sugar had to ask if they could bring some.. The tiny cup of soup wasn't even lukewarm and pumpkinsoup that was very runny/watery? They didn't even bother to clean the table outside or rake/sweep very old leaves on the patio and under the chairs and tables. And you get equal to one super tiny sandwich? Yeah, it definitely was not worth $80 not including gratuity and the hours worth of gas!
