TWG has opened its biggest shop in the world, with a tea museum you need a boarding pass to see

Singapore's newest tea museum can only be visited on the way out of the country.

Next time you fly from Terminal 3, get to Changi early on purpose. TWG Tea's largest shop in the world is airside, in the Departure/Transit Lounge North, and inside it is the company's first tea museum. Only departing and transit passengers get in, which is the catch, but it never closes, so the hour of your flight doesn't matter. Budget half an hour before the gate; a separate trip isn't an option anyway.

The museum is the reason to stop. TWG says it spent 15 years buying the collection around the world: more than 170 antique tea wares and over 50 antique Russian samovars, including pieces from the Tula workshops by makers such as the Batashev and Shemarin brothers, with Yixing clay teapots, European and Chinese porcelain and old tea caddies filling out the cases. Tea trainers lead guided tours. There is a small piece of local history in the cabinets, too: the word “caddy” comes from kati, the Malay unit of weight.

The shop around it is about 2,700 sq ft, with more than 1,200 tea tins stacked up one wall and a hand-painted world tea map running across a 23-foot ceiling. It is a boutique and takeaway counter rather than a sit-down salon, so don’t expect a pot and a scone. Instead there is what TWG bills as a first for Singapore, tea-infused ice cream and sorbet, in pandan gula melaka with coconut tea and soursop with temi, and a whole-leaf green tea, Grand Voyage, sold only here, which solves the airport-present problem for anyone who has already given everyone a yellow tin.

This is TWG’s sixth spot inside Changi’s transit areas, which says something about how many travellers leave Singapore with one of those tins in their hand luggage. It is the first with a reason to arrive early.

Good to know TWG Tea Gallery, Terminal 3 Departure/Transit Lounge North, #02-58B, Changi Airport. Airside: open to departing and transit passengers only. Open 24 hours. Tel +65 6904 1837.

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TWG Tea Gallery, Changi Airport Terminal 3 | #02-58B, Departure/Transit Lounge North, Changi Airport Terminal 3, 65 Airport Boulevard, Singapore 819663