Dancing on the Tea Leaves: The Curious Life of Jonathan Cain

Jonathan Kane traveled the world as a professional dancer before sharing his passion for the visual arts through teaching. Now based in Calgary, she rekindled her love for tea by opening her own tea shop, Bare Leaf.

Kane has always been a sports person, but never knew how to pursue his interest. She then took dance lessons as a required course in high school and enjoyed it and started dancing outside of class.

“It just clicked,” Kane says. “I like the whole package – music, working on myself, making something beautiful.”

After discovering his new love, Kane went on to study dance at the Juilliard School in New York. After graduating, Kane joined various dance theaters that saw him tour around the world.

“You name it, I got there,” says Kane, who has toured more than 18 countries in Europe, Asia and Scandinavia in addition to visits to China, Japan and Taiwan.

Being constantly on the go means Kane often needs caffeine to start his days, but his coffee allergy has left him feeling nauseous. Tea was an alternative. If coffee is too harsh for Kane, tea gives him a gentle boost to start his day.

“It's meditative, very different from coffee, which gives you a caffeine high,” Kane says.

However, while in Italy, he encountered Italian milk coffee, which seemed to cure his coffee allergy.

“Now I drink one or two cups a month, usually without sugar. “Other than that, I drink tea during the day,” says Kane.

Transition to tea specialty

The enjoyment of tea comes not only from Kane's sense of taste, but also from the process of making the tea. Different teapots and different brewing times are beneficial for Kane when it comes to taking the time to enjoy his tea.

“I feel good when I start my day,” Kane says. “What I love most is the process of making the tea and the feeling after drinking it.”

Although tea was always a constant for Kane, he did not share his love for it until the end of his life.

When Kane suffered an injury that ended Kane's professional dance career, he decided to settle in Europe to recover properly. He raised his family in Finland, but they intended to live in a country where they spoke and communicated in their native language, English. Canada was the main candidate.

In addition to her dance degree from Juilliard, Kane holds a master's degree in education from Columbia University, which earned her a teaching position at the University of Calgary—another reason she moved to Canada.

Once in Calgary, Kane had trouble finding the tea and tea products he wanted. Apart from an online store, there was no store in the city that shared his love and interest in tea.

He knew this was the next step in his career: opening a shop for true tea lovers who were looking to satisfy their tea needs.

Not knowing anything about running a business, Kane looked for additional educational opportunities to succeed and took an entrepreneurship course at Mount Royal University.

“It went from being a physical activity to something a little more mental,” Kane says. “It was a different way of thinking and a different way of processing information, (that's) I think the biggest change.”

Bare leaf

Kane's store name “Bare Leaf” emphasizes the natural state of tea and offers only teas that do not contain sugar, gluten or artificial colors and flavors.

“We have a lot of additives that you can't get anywhere else. That's why I'm proud of it,” he says.

16 years later, Kane's business is booming. Furthering her love of tea and travel, she organizes tea and culinary tours around the world and recently traveled to Nepal with a group of tea lovers.

“I think we will expand it in the future. Get more people to see how much work goes into tea production, so you really understand it,” he says.

Nicholas Crumb, an employee of The Naked Leaf since 2018, loves the energy and relationship he creates in the store, with Kane, his colleagues and the customer base.

“He seems to have cultivated a very nice group of people who like to have tea together,” says Crumb.

Kane's love and appreciation for tea is reflected in his success in business and plans to continue his hard work at The Naked Leaf.

“I think we are on the right track. “I like where we're going,” Kane says.

It depends

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