Textiles Craft

SONGKET

Songket is a fabric that belong to the brocade family of textiles. The origins of the many different colourful and traditional textile are lost in antiquity. The art of songket weaving consist of using traditional heirloom to make intricate songket brocade through painstaking weaving with gold or silver threads. Songket is a rich fabric and a luxury product traditionally worn during ceremonial occasions as sarong, shoulder clothes and head ties and used to be the textiles of royalty. Traditionally, costumes made of songket are worn by the Malays during ceremonial functions such as installations, investitures, religious celebrations, and weddings, as well as ceremonies marking the circumcision of young boys, the ear-piercing of young girls, the observance of shaving the hair of a newborn baby, and the rites performed for a woman who is seven months with child. Once reserved for royalty, the usage and wearing of the kain songket is nowadays most obviously apparent at formal and ceremonial occasions like weddings, convocations and state functions. It is now the headgear of Sultans, Chief Ministers and the State's Cabinet members.

source










Watch on Youtube


BATIK

Batik has been both an art and a craft for centuries. It is considered as a national art in Malaysia. Hand drawn batik is an exquisite and delicate art which requires skill, patience, meticulousness, flair and creativity. Batik is intrinsic to the fashion world, be it in cotton or silk or in the making of sarongs, crafts, pareos, shirts, shorts, handbags, purses and even shoes.

source