Traditional Textile of Indonesia

Indonesia is not only rich of culture and natural beauty, it is rich also of beautiful traditional textile. From Sumatra Island stretch to Papua, each island, each regions has authentic unique textile traditional textile which is popular as wastra Indonesia. And contact us if you want to explore and know deeper about Indonesia Traditional Textile, as we have tour packages for this special trip.

TENUN IKAT SUMBA uses natural dye from plants, mud and roots that can be found in the surrounding. Sumba is an island located south of Flores Island, and it is well known for its beautiful nature, local culture and yes, the weaving. Sumba tenun has unique motives, like horses, dragons, women, birds, chicken and each has meaning. Horse symbolizes prides, dragons symbolize power. Sumba women wok on traditional loom and it can take 3 months to make one piece of weaving through 42 phases. The price of Sumba weaving is expensive and it is worth to purchase.

ULOS is wastra from North Sumatra. Ulos means blanket. Ulos is similar to songket textile from Palembang. The loom used is manual loom. Ulos colors are dominated by red, white and black. There are various ulos for different event of Batak tribe, such as ragihotang, ragi hidup, sodum and sibolang.

GERINGSING is wastra from Bali. This tenun is the only wastra that uses double ikat technique. Geringsing derives from Gering means sick and Sing means not, that geringsing means “not sick”. Balinese believe that this textile will protect them from illness. Geringsing weaving can be found in Tenganan Pegringsingan village, and natural dyes are used for this textile.

FLORES IKAT WEAVING is one of the most artistic wastra. It takes 20 phases and long period of time to finish one tenun. Tenun Flores can be found in some parts of Flores, such as Maumere, Sikka, Ende, Ngada, Nagekeo, Manggarai, Lio and Lembata. Each region has different motives and colors. The motives represent tribes, customs, traditions, religions and life in Flores Island. Each pattern is meaningful.

TAPIS is traditional textile from Lampung, Sumatra Island. It is made out of cotton yarn and decorated with silver, gold or silk yarn. It was designed to honor ancestor, for ceremony and special events. But now people wear this relatively on any occasion.

BADUY WEAVING is traditional textile from Leba, Banten, West Java. They use manual loom. There are some motives of Baduy Tribe weaving, such as adumancung, suat songket, poleng and more. There are more than 20 motives of Baduyweaving. Each weaving is comfortable to skin. Natural dyes tenun can be found here as well as synthetic coloring. Let us know if you would like to visit BADUY tribe, we have special package tour to Baduy.

TENUN GEDOG is traditional textile from Tuban, East Java Indonesia. The weaver uses cotton yarn and weave on traditional loom. Tenun Gedog is not colored. After finish as textile, and then processed as batik.

LURIK is wastra from Yogyakarta with stripes pattern. There are few of Lurik patterns. The cotton yarns are spinned manually and then weaved on traditional loom called gedogan. Lurik has 6 phases, more simple than other weavings. Lurik is worn by Yogyakarta palace soldiers to meet the sultan and lurik outfit has been more universal and can be worn by anyone, cross-class. Lurik turns out to be older than batik, as it has been existed since 9th Century.

BATIK is wastra Indonesia that has been inscribed as Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO. Batik has evolves in Indonesian fashion industry. There are some types of Batik : hand-painted batik, stamped batik, combination batik and painted batik. Batik can be found in many regions and cities in Java.

ENDEK WEAVING is wastra Indonesia from Bali. The looms uses are manual looms. Endek Weaving can be found in the region of Jembrana, Buleleng, Klungkung and Karangasem. Every pattern has special meanings. Some patterns are only worn by royals. Some patterns are worn only on religious ceremonies. Endek weaving has been part of Christian Dior for summer 2021 collections.