"Kain Tenun Ikat Flores": A Cultural Wealth From East Indonesia.

Kain Tenun Ikat Flores.

Kain Tenun Ikat Flores is woven fabrics  traditionally made in Flores but high artistic value and wonderful. Kain Tenun Ikat Flores is not only a reflection of the beauty but the mix of colors and patterns represents the natural charm of Flores. That is the philosophy underlying the journey of human life in flower island. This is the beauty that made Portuguese called "Copa de Flores" to Flores, the area covered with the mountains and beach at the same time presenting a nature dyed with various types of flowers. The Portuguese arrived in Flores to seek spices as well spread the religion in this region rich in cloves, nutmeg, pepper, and hazelnut.

The process of making the product a distinctive cultural heritage of the island in the eastern part of Indonesia have passed a number of time-consuming process for months. It takes persistence and patience to produce a piece of woven cloth in which almost all of the connective fabric-making process is done traditionally and manually and requires perseverance and patience.

There are at least over 20 stages and take for nearly a month so that a woven fabric Flores can pamper the eyes and appreciated demand purchase and sale transactions. The process of making Kain Tenun typical Flores begins by separating cotton from seed, cotton spinning it into yarn, dyeing process, binding motif, and the last just started weaving. No special equipment is used to separate the cotton from the seeds included for the thread that has been woven. 

In yarn dyeing, weaving traditional craftsmen still use traditional dyes obtained from nature. For example, by using several types of plants, such as leaves and roots of noni (red), leaf sap (blue), wood Hepang, turmeric (yellow), greedy, bark of mango trees, bark brown, dust mahogany indigo, zopha , pecans, and much more. Staining can be done repeatedly to produce a distinctive color. There are at least 11 colors are created from natural materials that are environmentally friendly. The color of natural materials and thread of cotton makes the color is not bright modern thread but it is more durable and reveals the colors more and more beautiful.

Some areas in Flores is a woven cloth production centers, among which are Maumere, Ende, Manggarai, Ngada, Nage Keo, Lio, and Lembata in the eastern part of Flores. Each region or ethnicity has a variety of motifs, patterns and preferences of different colors in making ikat. Such diversity is a form of manifestation of symbols that represent the ethnic, indigenous, religious, and other things of everyday people Flores.

The weaving cloth typical of the Sikka region, for example, are usually always use dark colors such as black, brown, blue, and blue-black. For motive, there is some kind of distinctive, namely the motive okukirei is based on the story of sub-ethnic ancestors formerly Sikka is an accomplished sailor. Figure fisherman, boat, shrimp, or crabs become characteristic of the fabric of this type of motif. There is also a kind of motif mawarani is decorated with a pattern of roses. That said, this motif is typical motifs specific to the daughters of the Kingdom Sikka. This motif has now become the favorite of women.