Tan Ying Hsien qualified as the first and only Singaporean Master of Wine (MW) in 2015. He Won the Institute of Masters of Wine Champagne Trinity Scholarship 2010 and was nominated to attend the Master Napa Programme in September 2013. He also won a French Wine Society scholarship for the Sud de France Master Level Program in 20 1 3 and the 2013 AXA Miilesimes Scholarship for MW students.
A member of the Ordre des Coteaux de Champagne, La Confrerie des Chevaliers du Tastevin and Commanderie de Bordeaux, Ying started tasting and studying wine as a hobby in 1983 while pursuing law studies at university in the United Kingdom. In 2009, after more than 20 years as a corporate and banking lawyer, he embarked on a different career path building on his enthusiasm for wine to become a wine journalist, speaker and educator. He now owns Taberna Wine Academy where he conducts tastings and classes. Taberna Wine Academy has hosted many leading wine producers including Laurent Ponsot, Benjamin Leroux, Olivier Humbrecht MW, Nicolas Potel, Bruno Paillard, Michele Jermann and Serge Hochar.
As a speaker, Ying organized and hosted a Business Times Wine Night for senior business executives in 2010 and co-hosted the wine segment of the Wine & Dine TV series broadcast on Channel News Asia in the late 1990s.
He wrote an occasional column for Wine & Dine magazine in 2003 and 2004 and freelance for a number of publications including Cuisine & Wine and Appetite.
Ying has judged at wine competitions including the International Wine Challenges held in Singapore and at the Decanter Asia Wine Awards from 2012 to 2014 in Hong Kong. He was also a judge at the 5th Singapore National Sommelier Competition in 2014. He was on the tasting panel of Wine & Dine, Singapore for a number years and was consulting wine editor of Cuisine & Wine. Ying was a wine consultant to the World Gourmet Summit 2013.
The wine regions that Ying has visited include all the classic wine regions of France, the Russian Tsar's former cellars at Massandra, as well as wine regions in Australia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Portugal, South Africa, Spain and the USA.
