Batik from Jambi

The still-thriving batik tradition of Jambi in Sumatra has from time to time borrowed elements from external sources such as Java, India and Turkey. However, the predominantly Malay people of Jambi have incorporated these features into designs which are characteristically Malay in their symmetrical half-drop designs and floral motifs. Although in the past many writers have described Jambi batiks as having a characteristic red colour, by the early twentieth century most batik produced in Jambi was dyed in a combination of deep blue and golden yellow. The impression of shimmering gold was produced by dyeing the whole cloth in an infusion of wood chips from the lembato tree before the cloth was waxed. After the indigo bath, the wax was cracked and the cloth immersed in a warm brown dyebath made from the bark of another tree found locally, the marelang. The result was a marbling in the yellow panels around the edges of the cloth which from a distance made the cloths seem as if they had been embroidered in gold. The most prestigious cloths in Malay societies are songket, silk brocades interwoven with gold thread, and most batik designs from Jambi echo the designs of their brocades.

See Kerlogue, Fiona. 2004. Flowers, fruit and fragrance: the batiks of Jambi. In Itie van Hout (ed.) Batik: Drawn in Wax. Amsterdam: Tropenmuseum.