From Handan glass to a Kunming tannery
A kit that spends much of the year on the road between tea mountains, tasting labs, and partner workshops has to survive rough travel. The leather deluxe edition grew out of a collaboration with a small tannery outside Kunming that still uses traditional vegetable tanning — mimosa and quebracho barks, no chrome, no shortcuts. The case, custom-fitted with foam padding for each glass piece, started as a one-off; sommeliers kept asking where they could get one.
The glass inside is the same Handan borosilicate as the standard line — the same family bench, checked on regular Hebei visits for clarity, heat resistance, and that thin, fire-polished rim. Unlike the canvas version, this kit includes a thermos slot, on the theory that a working sommelier never travels without hot water already at temperature. Each piece is inspected under daylight-spectrum light, packed, and re-checked after a simulated drop test before it ships.