The Luxury Was Always Ours: Laura Shanley On Reclaiming Caribbean Tea Culture
Long before wellness became a global industry and luxury brands began packaging mindfulness for the masses, Caribbean families understood the restorative power of the land around them.
Fever grass, soursop leaves, bay leaf, mint and countless other herbs found their way into kettles and enamel cups, sometimes as a morning ritual, sometimes offered to settle an uneasy stomach, soothe a cold or simply help you rest.
Our backyards served as pharmacies, our elders as healers, and our traditions as quiet reminders that the land had always given us ways to care for ourselves and each other.
Across the Caribbean, bush tea is more than a collection of herbal brews. It is part of our cultural inheritance, a tradition shaped by generations of knowledge about the plants that grow around us and carried forward largely through observation, conversation and practice. You learned because your grandmother made it, because someone sent you outside to pick the leaves, or because there was always a particular bush the family turned to when something ailed you.
And while the world has since found new language for many of these practices — wellness, herbalism, holistic living — for Caribbean people, much of it has simply been a way of life.
For Grenadian-born entrepreneur Laura Shanley, those traditions were never relics of the past. They became the foundation the inspiration for Modestine, a luxury wellness tea house that is quietly redefining how the world experiences Caribbean heritage.
Laura’s relationship with tea began long before the elegant packaging, curated tea experiences now synonymous with her brand and international attention.
It began in Grenada, under the guidance of her grandmother, Modestine.
“I was born and raised in Grenada, and at the age of nine, my grandmother Modestine started teaching me all about teas,” Laura recalled. “I loved it, but I didn’t really pay too much attention to it until I started getting older—and definitely when I moved to the United States.”
As a child, she was captivated by the simple magic of Caribbean tea culture: walking into a backyard, gathering leaves from the earth and transforming them into something that could nourish, soothe and heal.
“I always admired our culture, our tea culture in particular,” she said. “I just thought the idea of waking up, going to your backyard, picking leaves and then making them into something you can drink that tastes good was magical.”
At the time, those practices were simply part of life. Like many traditions inherited in childhood, their true significance became clearer only after distance separated Laura from home.
That distance came when she moved to the United States and later entered law school. The pressures of academic life quickly intensified—bringing headaches, tension, homesickness and the emotional strain of adjusting to a demanding new environment.
In search of relief, she returned to what she knew.
Tea.
“I resorted back to tea,” she said.
Among her most treasured possessions were some of her grandmother’s handwritten recipes. Time had made portions of the handwriting difficult to decipher, but Laura was able to retrieve enough to reconnect with the knowledge Granny Modestine had shared with her decades earlier.
Those recipes would eventually help form the foundation of her blends and, ultimately, the brand that would carry her grandmother’s name.
The idea for Modestine did not emerge solely from Laura’s personal love of tea. It was strengthened by what she discovered—or failed to discover—while studying to become a certified tea sommelier.
As part of her training, Laura studied the established tea traditions of several regions around the world. Yet as she worked through a comprehensive text examining global tea cultures, she noticed a glaring omission.
The Caribbean was barely represented.
Because she had been raised within a rich and deeply rooted tea culture, Laura naturally expected to see the region included alongside the world’s other celebrated traditions.
It was not.
“That’s when all of this started for me,” she explained. “There were so many similarities, as well as things that were unique to us.”
Her instructor, a Buddhist tea master, was equally intrigued by the Caribbean traditions Laura incorporated into her assignments. He frequently commented on her ability to connect the material being taught to her own roots.
“He told me that, as a tea master who had travelled around the world, he had not really heard much about our tea culture,” she recalled. “He said it was a very unique perspective, and I took that and ran with it.”
His reaction affirmed something Laura was already beginning to understand: Caribbean tea culture was not lacking in depth, value or sophistication. It was simply absent from many of the spaces where global tea traditions were being documented and celebrated.
“I said to myself, ‘It is so known throughout the Caribbean. How come we are not amplifying it more?’” she said. “This needs to be in the global conversation with other tea cultures.”
Modestine became her way of ensuring that it would be.
Laura’s mission is grounded in pride, but it is also fuelled by frustration.
Across the global wellness industry, herbs, fruits and traditional remedies long used throughout the Caribbean are increasingly being repackaged, rebranded and resold—often at prices that make them difficult for Caribbean people in the diaspora to access.
She remembers walking into a store in the United States and coming across a soursop so small she could almost cover it with her fist. The price was US$45.
When she reacted with surprise, a store employee attempted to justify the cost by pointing to the label.
It had been imported from Grenada.
“They saw the value,” Laura said. “That was one of my biggest frustrations, watching these things be repackaged and resold to us at a cost, when at home you could wake up and pick them in your yard or your neighbour’s yard.”
The experience further strengthened her resolve to build a company connected to the source. That has meant returning to Grenada, supporting local farmers and businesses, and finding ways to make Caribbean ingredients more accessible beyond the region.
It has also required confronting a difficult question: Why do Caribbean people sometimes recognise the value of their traditions only after those traditions have been validated or commercialised elsewhere?
Laura believes part of the answer lies in familiarity. When people are raised surrounded by something, it can be easy to overlook its significance.
“We don’t appreciate it because we are raised in it,” she said. “Then we move away and begin to see it differently.”
But she also believes the issue runs deeper.
Certain aspects of Caribbean identity, knowledge and culture were historically conditioned to appear less valuable, less sophisticated or less worthy than imported ideas. Today, many of the very practices once dismissed as old-fashioned are being repositioned as global wellness trends.
“When wellness became a trend and people began looking for better things to feed their bodies, we realised, ‘Oh my God, this was in our backyard,’” Laura said. “A lot of it is that we were not taught to appreciate what we had.”
Modestine is, in many ways, her response to that conditioning, a reclamation of Caribbean knowledge by a Caribbean woman determined to define its value on her own terms.
The word “luxury” sits prominently within Modestine’s identity, but Laura’s interpretation of it is not rooted simply in price, exclusivity or extravagance.
For her, luxury is an experience.
It is knowing where the ingredients in a cup of tea were grown. It is understanding the stories attached to them. It is slowing down long enough to appreciate the aroma, flavour and care that went into preparing them.
It is also recognising beauty in ingredients that exist in their most natural state.
“When we say Caribbean bush tea, people may not immediately associate that with luxury,” she said. “But that is the heart of luxury-the natural, raw bush in its natural environment.”
Luxury, she argued, does not always require something to be polished, excessively refined or separated from its origins.
“The natural state of something can also be luxury,” she said.
That philosophy has resonated strongly with Caribbean people in the diaspora. Rather than questioning whether bush tea could occupy the luxury space, many welcomed the idea that traditions inherited from their parents and grandparents were finally being elevated and celebrated.
Laura recalled being approached by two Caribbean people while attending the Caribbean American Day Parade in New York. They had seen her being interviewed and wanted to express their support.
“They told me, ‘I really love what you are doing because we have luxury in the Caribbean,’” she said.
For Laura, that affirmation mattered.
“There is nothing wrong with amplifying our blends as luxury,” she insisted. “We have luxury in the Caribbean too.”
That luxury is not confined to beaches, resorts or the carefully curated experiences often marketed to visitors. It exists within the region’s history, agriculture, food, hospitality, ancestral knowledge and everyday rituals.
Too often, she said, travellers experience only a narrow version of the Caribbean—remaining within resort boundaries without encountering the people, traditions and communities that give the region its true character.
“Some people think the Caribbean is just about the beach,” she said. “I want them to be exposed to the depth of who we are.”
Building a luxury brand with international ambitions can often create pressure to soften or minimise the cultural identity at its centre.
Laura, however, has never considered making Modestine less Caribbean simply to secure wider acceptance.
She is prepared to be strategic about how she enters particular spaces, but not at the expense of who she is.
“There may be certain adjustments you make to open the door,” she explained. “But when I get through the door, I am still very much me. I am still very Caribbean, and the rest of the Caribbean will unfold from there.”
She compared the approach to finding the right key.
The presentation may shift slightly depending on the room, but the identity behind it remains intact.
“When people hear me speak, they will know, feel and hear that I am Caribbean to the bone.”
That unapologetic identity is central to the Modestine experience. Laura wants customers to encounter more than an attractive product or a beautifully staged tea service. She wants them to discover the richness of Caribbean culture and reconsider what they believe luxury, wellness and sophistication can look like.
“I want people to come into the deep realisation of how beautiful our culture is,” she said. “I want them to recognise the many beautiful things we grow in our own backyards and understand that we do not always need to look outside of who we are.”
Laura believes the Caribbean is not simply capable of participating in the global wellness conversation. In many ways, it has been practising wellness for generations.
“The Caribbean is a wellness hub,” she declared. “The world is missing out on a bigger part of wellness that it hasn’t fully seen.”
That knowledge goes beyond the medicinal properties of individual herbs. It includes the relationship Caribbean elders maintained with the land, the seasons and the natural rhythms governing daily life.
Laura remembers her grandmother and great-aunts living what she describes as a cyclical lifestyle.
“They woke up with the moon. They planted with the moon. Everything was according to the moon cycle,” she recalled.
Today, practices linked to lunar cycles, grounding, herbal remedies and intentional living are increasingly promoted within the modern wellness industry. Yet they were embedded within Caribbean communities long before they became commercially fashionable.
Laura believes the industry could learn not only from the practices themselves, but from the spirit in which they were carried out.
“There is a reverence and respect that should be given to plants before you even pick them,” she said. “There must be a level of respect for nature.”
For her, wellness should not be extractive. It should acknowledge the land, the communities and the generations of knowledge that make these traditions possible.
While Modestine has expanded to include a wider variety of herbs and tea traditions, its Caribbean foundation remains its defining force.
Among Laura’s personal favourites is “Sip Grenada,” a blend she describes as a love letter to her homeland. Caribbean Crème also remains close to her heart.
One of the company’s most popular offerings is Queendom Reign, a women’s wellness blend connected to Laura’s own experience with hormonal disruption.
The herbs in the blend supported her as she worked to restore balance within her body, giving the product a story that resonates with other women.
“I think, outside of the benefits of the herbs, it is the story behind how it supported my journey that people connect with,” she said.
Story is woven into every part of Modestine. The brand carries her grandmother’s name, her childhood memories, her experience of migration and her determination to ensure Caribbean tea culture is given its rightful place.
That authenticity has become one of the most rewarding parts of the journey.
“The biggest highlight is seeing how people embrace the raw Caribbeanness of it,” Laura said. “People say, ‘Oh my God, I never knew.’ That gives me so much joy and pride.”
The road has not been without challenges. In the early stages, one of Laura’s greatest difficulties was reconnecting with and marketing directly to the Caribbean community in the United States.
Over time, however, that community became one of the brand’s greatest sources of support.
“Caribbean people tell somebody, and then that person tells somebody,” she said. “The support has been good.”
As Modestine grows, Laura is expanding its reach through new partnerships, including plans to work with a wellness studio in the United Kingdom. She is also focused on deepening the brand’s relationship with Grenada and the wider Caribbean.
Her advice to other entrepreneurs-particularly those attempting to build businesses grounded in Caribbean identity-is direct.
“Close one ear,” she said.
The only voice an entrepreneur should never stop listening to, she believes, is the one within.
“Do not listen to the people who say it is not going to work, that it is too hard or that someone else is already doing it,” she advised. “Listen to yourself.”
That does not mean rejecting all advice, she clarified. It means developing the discernment to determine what aligns with one’s own purpose.
“This is a you journey,” she said. “Follow your heart and make the decisions as they come. Some things do not have to be fully ready. Just go with what your heart is telling you.”
It is a philosophy she has lived.
Few may have imagined that the bush teas of her Grenadian childhood could become the foundation of an internationally positioned luxury wellness brand.
But Laura did.
Ask Laura why someone unfamiliar with Grenada should add the island to their travel plans, and her answer begins not with beaches, waterfalls or spices, but with its people.
“The Grenadian spirit,” she said. “The warmth and the welcome.”
She wants visitors to explore the country’s history and experience the island beyond the version presented from within resort walls.
That desire mirrors the larger purpose behind Modestine.
A cup of tea may be the introduction, but Laura hopes it opens the door to something deeper—a more expansive understanding of Grenada, the Caribbean and the cultural knowledge that has sustained its people for generations.
In Modestine, the leaves gathered from Caribbean backyards are no longer treated as ordinary. The recipes once written by hand are no longer confined to family memory. The rituals passed quietly between grandmother and granddaughter are now travelling into new rooms, new cities and new conversations.
Laura Shanley is not simply asking the world to drink Caribbean tea.
She is asking it to recognise the beauty, wisdom and luxury that were always there.
