Convergence: The elegance of piña, the fabric that the world recognized as uniquely Pinoy

From colonial grandeur to national heritage: the decline and resurgence of piña in Filipino business, entertainment, and lifestyle

Mention the pinya—the fruit with a Tagalog name derived from the Spanish “pineapple”—and an image of a  sweet, juicy, pulpy, multi-eyed fruit crowned by a number of long, green, blade-like leaves comes to mind.

And there is the piña fabric—that diaphanous, delicate, rich, woven cloth made from the mature spiny leaf fibers of the pineapple plant.  The world has recognized this textile as uniquely Filipino. 

That fragile thread

The leaves from which the piña fiber is extracted come from the pineapple variety called the Spanish Red or the native Philippine Red. These species grow leaves as long as two meters, making their fibers excellent for weaving into textiles.  It takes a year after planting before the leaves (some three to five pieces) are harvested from each plant 

Extracting the piña fiber is a long and painstaking process. The leaf’s green outer layer is scraped away by hand using pieces of coconut shells and pottery or china shards.  Each strand of fiber, measuring some two feet long, is then carefully pulled away from the leaf layer by layer and then knotted together into a single long thread. Knotting the fiber into threads is constantly done since it easily breaks.  It is also so delicate that the ends of the knots that are made are usually cut with the edge of a bamboo stick shaped like a blade.

The extracted fibers are sorted into three kinds: the pinukpok that is used to make the piña cloth,  a finer thread called liniwan,  and the rough fiber called bastos that is used for twine.

The next step after the fiber is removed is warping.  Here the fiber is looped on pegs stuck on a board to produce piña yarns. It normally takes two weeks to produce enough yarn for at least 60 meters of cloth. The yarn is then spun and placed on bobbins as preparation for the weaving loom. The size and thickness of the cloth is determined by a part of the loom called the sucod.  A light, translucent fabric is then produced, with the thickness depending on the weave. 

Textile transformation

A pina cloth is normally white or beige in color depending on the washing process when the fiber is extracted, but it can be dyed by hand into a blue or black cloth using natural plant dyes.  Hand-decorating the cloth is done by the weavers, who use local designs like native plants (the coconut tree is a popular one)  and rural scenes like nipa huts. Embroidery is also one way of decorating the cloth with a fine embroidery style called calado, where the fibers are pulled apart and reworked into intricate designs.  The finished product is called piña calado.

The time spent in finishing a pina cloth dress—a barong tagalog, a terno, or even a  wedding dress—depended on the make of the cloth (its thickness and width) and the intricacy of the design. 

The elegant cloth

The 19^th century saw the piña cloth becoming popular in the fashion circles of Spanish-colonial Philippines and Europe. It was an attraction in the London Great The Exhibition of 1851 was an event similar to the present-day world expositions. Dresses and accessories like handkerchiefs with lace-like piña fabric designs became part of the wardrobe of the local and foreign elite as well as European royalty.  

But the piña fabric’s popularity soon faded after the Spanish colonial government opened the Philippines to world trade at the start of the 19^th century.  England exported cotton textiles to the colony.  Bolts of cotton cloth, which were easier to work with and used to mass-produce clothes, soon flooded the market.  Piña-making was reduced to a specialized household industry, where looms became part of the furniture of a middle-class provincial family whose members had knowledge of the craft.  It wasn’t long before the fashion shift and fabric preferences among the Filipino elite—from the barong and terno to the American-influenced cotton dress designs and sharkskin suits—led to the complete decline of the popularity of clothes made of piña fabric.

It took several decades—almost a century, in fact—before interest in the piña began again. Credit for the resurgence of dresses using pina cloth is given to former First Lady Imelda R. Marcos started a fashion trend of wearing expensive piña ternos during her husband President Ferdinand Marcos, Sr.’s administration, which began in the 1960s for her formal public appearances. Later, this trend became an iconic feature of the First Lady’s wardrobe.  This trend was eventually followed by the elite, and soon, piña barongs and ternos returned as the Filipiniana formal wear in the country.

A heritage of fineness

Aklan was initially the center of the piña fiber and cloth industry in the Philippines. But other provinces like Negros Oriental and Palawan began to follow the production trend by starting to cultivate pineapples and then conducting training skills in pina fiber production.  Soon, these two provinces were contributing to the export of  piña fabric as global interest grew.

Unfortunately, a market for piña cloth is not conducive as a large business enterprise.  The process is labor-intensive and time-consuming, given the fragility of the thread and fabric and the amount of cloth needed to sustain a stable piña fabric industry.

However, piña weaving received well-deserved recognition as a Philippine cultural heritage when the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Intergovernmental Committee issued its decision to inscribe the handloom weaving of Aklan piña on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2023.

In its decision, the committee noted that “inscription would ensure visibility and awareness of intangible cultural heritage in general… at the local, national, and international levels.”  It stated that the recognition “would also increase awareness about how the element contributes to the communities’ identity, creative industries, and sustainable development” as well as “instill pride, resulting in greater attention to other expressions of living heritage and providing an incentive to learn more about them.” 

The latest recognition of the making of the piña fabric returned it to its place as a renowned textile that is originally Filipino. 

 

 

The world has recognized the piña fabric—that diaphanous, delicate, rich, woven cloth made from the mature spiny leaf fibers of the pineapple plant—as uniquely Filipino. But its creation is a long and painstaking process. 

 

 

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