Tea at Shiloh is a world one wanders into when they’re looking for home.

For many years, prior to the birth of the teahouse, Nicole was searching. Searching for community, for herself, for space, for meaning. She felt isolated by her sensitivities and over-stimulated by her environment. Her life felt like a reaction. In response to. Because of.

When her father passed away, her reaction to grief transformed into creation.

Although at the time she couldn't fully explain why, the name Shiloh came to her and she claimed it. When she was Shiloh, she finally felt at home—or at least that she had set the foundation for a home.

During this time of transformation, she began spending time at teahouses—healing, stepping into her chosen name, quietly reading and relaxing in cozy corners—inspired by the conversations and energy surrounding her.

An introvert at her core, these spaces offered community and solitude. They offered an opportunity to be alone, together. Tea spaces became a safe haven for her sensitivities. In these spaces, she felt comfortable to express who she was becoming. She felt accepted as Shiloh.

While hanging out at a teahouse, all of the guests were told that it was closing time. As she walked home, she started to question why the evening offered so very few options for people like her. So few places to go when you didn't quite want to be extroverted, but you didn't quite want to go home. So few places that felt safe. All of these places closed when the sun went down. Why?

That night she started researching ‘late night teahouses' to no avail. She started imagining a space she could go to listen to jazz while sipping a cup of tea, a place that felt like home, but with the opportunity for chance encounters, but most of all a place where she would feel less alone. She started writing out the words this place would feel like: dreamy, warm, natural, romantic, introspective, poetic and mysterious.

Tea—the spaces it filled and the people it attracted— took her in, accepted her for who she was, and inspired her to fully become Shiloh.

Almost a year later, she would come to find that ‘Shiloh' meant a place of peace; tranquility and abundance. The name had brought her peace, creativity, confidence, and the community she had always been seeking. She wanted to share this feeling with the world and decided she would create a space for others seeking. She would name her future space Shiloh: A (Late Night) Teahouse.

Through her journey of creation she met Kai. He believed in her vision and had an excellent eye for design. After the pandemic, they started searching for the home of the teahouse that she had been dreaming of for years. He helped her put together a plan and together they were going to bring it to life.

A month after signing the lease, Ahdom, now Shiloh's partner, came into the picture. He brought his background in architecture and love of tea to the space. He polished and refined what Shiloh and Kai had started.

Together, Shiloh, Kai and Ahdom, brought the teahouse to life. Out of dream-form into the physical.

& the teahouse continues to evolve with you.

~

This story has so many tributaries, so many people to thank, so many more magical coincidences that I hope to share with you one day if we ever meet.

In the meantime, thank you for reading this. Thank you for coming to the teahouse. Thank you for sharing your magic in this space. It's part of what makes our space feel so mysterious, why no night is ever the same.

And whether you’re familiar with us by now, or have yet to walk through our doors, we can't wait to host you.

”…if she cannot find the culture that encourages her,

then she usually decides to construct it herself

And that is good

For if she builds it

Others who have been looking for a long time will mysteriously arrive one day

enthusiastically proclaiming that they have been looking for this all along“

-iii