Teatime With @HelloAdrianne

Teatime with Adrianne. This Teatime—a storytelling series sharing people's unique experiences with tea—we chatted with Adrianne Paerels (@HelloAdrianne), a New Jersey based artist whose work centers around food and oftentimes incorporates nostalgia and humor.

Q: Who are you? What do you do? 

Hi! I'm Adrianne, an artist based in New Jersey. My work focuses on food, and often incorporates nostalgia and some humor.

Q: What is your relationship to tea? 

I love tea and how versatile it is. My go-to pick-me-up beverage is tied between matcha and dirty chai. I also love a good unsweetened coconut ice tea. It is just such a cure-all! Tea always revives me. 

Q: What significance does tea have in your life? 

I got my love of tea from my mom. She's always drinking iced black tea, and when I drink it I think of her! I even remember one time a doctor asking my mom if she was drinking enough water and her response was, "I drink a lot of unsweetened ice tea!" hahah.

Q: Share a tea memory & its significance to your life

I come from a long line of tea lovin' ladies. Just this week I was in Texas, visiting my grandma with my mom and my aunt. We haven't all been together in more than ten years. One day on the trip, we went out for ice tea together. We came back to my grandma's house with our tea and sat around the table looking at photos dating back to the 1940s and the stories to match. It was such a beautiful day that I will always remember.