Section

Cloth & Craft

The cloth of the peninsula: how batik and songket are made, how to tell hand work from print, and how a length of cloth is tied so it stays on.

Photo: Daderot · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

Decoded

Sarong, kain, and samping are terms that often overlap when it comes to traditional Malay waist cloths, but each word actually points to a different…

Side by side

Batik and songket are two traditional textiles of Malaysia, but they are made by very different techniques. Batik is a resist dyeing process using…

How to

A sarong is a tube of cloth, and the whole skill is in the fold that holds it shut. Step in, pull it to the waist, take up the slack and tuck it —…

What it costs

The first defense in buying real batik in Malaysia is to turn the cloth over. Check if the design shows through to the other side. Genuine batik…

■From the archive