History & culture

Cotton fabric with bold, wax-resist-dyed patterns, industrially produced in Europe from the 19th century in imitation of Indonesian batik and adopted as a distinctive West African fashion textile.

A Vietnamese national dress consisting of a long, fitted tunic with side slits worn over loose trousers, developed in its modern form during the 1930s from earlier court dress.

A wax-resist dyeing technique in which molten wax is applied to fabric to block dye from certain areas, producing intricate patterns; long practiced in Indonesia, especially Java, and recognized by UNESCO in 2009.

A Japanese tradition of patching and mending indigo cotton textiles with layered scraps, born of necessity among rural families from the Edo period into the 20th century and later admired as folk art.

The traditional dress of Korea, consisting of a short jacket (jeogori) and a high-waisted wrapped skirt (chima) for women, worn historically and today for formal and ceremonial occasions.

A loose, sleeveless tunic woven and embroidered by Indigenous Maya women of Mexico and Central America, with patterns that traditionally signal the wearer's home village and community.

A resist-dyeing technique in which yarns are bound and dyed in patterns before weaving, so the design emerges from the woven cloth itself; practiced across Southeast Asia, Central Asia, and Latin America.

A brightly printed rectangular cotton cloth from East Africa, worn wrapped as clothing and often printed with a Swahili proverb along its border, used for dress, carrying children, and ceremony.

A traditional Japanese T-shaped garment constructed from straight-cut bolts of fabric sewn with minimal waste, wrapped left over right and secured with an obi sash; its basic form has changed little for centuries.

A hand-stitched reverse-appliqué textile made by Guna women of Panama and Colombia, formed by layering and cutting through colored cotton fabrics to reveal patterns beneath, traditionally worn as a blouse panel.

A close-fitting Chinese dress with a mandarin collar and side slit, evolving in Shanghai during the 1920s from the looser Manchu changpao into a modern, tailored garment.

A patchwork and appliqué quilt made by women in Pakistan, northwest India, and Sindh from recycled cotton and silk fabric scraps, hand-stitched in geometric patterns across generations.

An unstitched length of fabric, typically five to nine meters, draped and wrapped around the body in various regional styles across South Asia, worn with a fitted blouse and underskirt.

A Japanese hand-stitching technique using simple running stitches in white thread on indigo cloth, originally developed to reinforce and mend workwear, now also used decoratively.