What It Is

老濟安 (Healing Herbar) is a Taiwanese herbal-medicine shop that brews its product using pour-over coffee equipment. Founded in 1972 as 濟安青草店 by 王張五妹 (Wang Chang Wu-mei) and her brother-in-law 陳清得 (Chen Ching-te), it began at No. 220 Xichang Street — immediately beside 青草巷 (Herb Alley), the covered lane of herb vendors adjoining Longshan Temple — and operated for decades as a wholesale supplier of raw herbs to Taipei's herbal-tea trade rather than as a consumer shop.

Second-generation proprietor 王榮貴 (Wang Jung-kuei), known to customers as 王老師 ("Teacher Wang"), compounded bespoke formulas — historically against the 藥籤 (medicinal divination slips) drawn by petitioners at the temple. The business relocated to its current Xichang Street address, a former warehouse, in 2010.

In 2017 third-generation proprietor 王柏諺 (Wang Po-yen) rebuilt the interior as a bar and converted the preparation method: herbs are ground, loaded into a filter, and extracted with a gooseneck kettle at the counter in front of the customer. The blend is decided in conversation — complexion, sleep, diet, current complaint — and mixed per cup. The family's fifty-plus years of formula records are the input; the extraction method is the only thing borrowed from coffee.

Location

District: Wanhua (萬華區)
Address: No. 84, Xichang Street, Wanhua District (台北市萬華區西昌街84號)
Nearest MRT: Longshan Temple Station (龍山寺站, Blue Bannan Line) — approximately 5–8 minutes on foot.
Telephone: +886-2-2314-1878

Opening Hours

Tuesday–Saturday 09:00–19:00. Closed Sunday and Monday.

Price Range

  • Iced herbal tea, bowl service: NTD 100
  • Hot pour-over blend, pot service: NTD 150
  • Custom-compounded tea sachets: approximately NTD 30 each
  • Bath sachets (沐浴包) and 淨化 cleansing range: retail; confirm at counter
DIY workshop: bookable in advance for parties of four or more. Telephone reservation required; not offered on a walk-in basis.

Specific Items Worth Buying

Custom-compounded tea sachets, approx. NTD 30 each. The consultation output in carryable form. Buy after the counter consultation, not before — the blend is chosen against what the proprietor observes, and a sachet bought blind is a generic product. Sachets are dry, sealed, light, and pass customs without difficulty as dried plant matter for personal use.
Bath sachets (沐浴包). The same herb inventory in bathing rather than drinking format. The single most transportable item in the shop and the one with no equivalent in the standard Taipei souvenir range.
Named house pour-over blends — 元氣百倍茶, 神清氣爽茶, 地錦板藍茶 — developed for modern diets and sleep patterns rather than transcribed from the wholesale book. Drink in, NTD 150 pot.

Why It Is Unusual

Herb Alley itself is on the standard Longshan Temple circuit and is out of scope as a destination. 老濟安 is not in it. The shop sits on Xichang Street proper, is not a stall, and has a full sit-down counter — visitors who walk the alley for photographs generally never enter it.

The substantive point is the inversion of the business. Taiwanese herbal tea is sold in the street as a cheap bulk commodity from a vat. This shop takes the same materia medica and applies single-cup extraction, per-customer formulation and counter service — a method transfer from specialty coffee onto a pharmacopoeia that predates it by centuries. Nothing about the herbs is modernised; only the water contact is.

Provenance is the third factor. Very few of the original Herb Alley supply houses survived the wholesale trade's decline, and fewer are still run by the founding family. This one is on its third generation and still holds the formula records that made it a supplier rather than a retailer.

Verified currently operating: active Taipei City Friendly Store Directory listing (property 7364); LINE 熱點 listing; WalkerLand feature (article 306608); VERSE magazine profile; Facebook page (HealingHerbar) and Instagram (@laojianm) both active; hotel-outlet expansion reported 2025. Checked 5 Aug 2026.