Brocade weaving gives Dao women a new lease of life

Enjoying a light breeze from the nearby green mountains, groups of Vietnamese and foreign visitors stroll along a paved road leading to Ta Phin commune where Dao women wearing colourful costumes with red scarves around their heads are gathered in a front yard.

Some of the Dao women, carrying on their backs papooses full of brocade items, introduce them in competent English. This is really a nice surprise for many foreigners.

“Please buy some of my products,” says Lo Su May.

While choosing some small souvenirs from her basket, I tell her,” You speak English very well”.

She replies with a smile: "Recently we have met many foreign visitors. Sometimes they come in big groups. We like to speak English in the hope of making a quick sale."

"Who taught you English?"

"We’ve learnt it from the foreigners and others and try to practise everyday,” she says, revealing that the Mong can speak English even better than the Dao.

May says she had attended two English classes, but when her father died she had to quit studying and stay at home to do farming.

"We can only grow one rice crop and one maize crop each year. Brocade weaving is our extra job, but it brings us an important source of income," she says.

Ta Phin commune has about 1,000 Dao people, all bearing the first name of May.

Tan Lo May, 39, says the Dao have settled in the area for about a century.

"A young Dao girl starts learning how to weave when she is 8-9 years old. After three years, she can grasp most of basic weaving skills."

“It’s OK to learn the craft a few years later but there is little chance of becoming an expert,” she says.

Dao women usually wear long blouses or skirts and their clothes are colourfuly embroidered.

Their brocade designs are engraved in their memories with different patterns of leaves, pine trees, birds, animals and human figures…

“The Dao have about 70 brocade designs but only a few of them can weave all intricate patterns without the help of others,” she says.

To make any item of brocade they have to go through a dozen stages, from boiling the fibre with ash, washing it until it is white, then drying and dyeing it with indigo or colourful pigments, before weaving patterns into the cloth.

"If all the stages have been done carefully, the colour will not fade," she says.

Chao Man May, 21, says their products often sell for VND50,000 to VND200,000 each.

"We can't go selling products all the time, because we have to do farming and go to the forest to collect firewood.”

"One virtue of weaving is we can do it in our free time, wear nice and cool items of brocade and also sell them for money."

Brocade sales have become an important source of income which helps improve their living standards.

Club’s help

The local Brocade Weaving Development Club plays an important part in preserving and developing the local craft. Some 250 women have joined the club, each earning an average monthly income of VND400,000. The club also offers loans for poor women to stabilise their lives.

The club’s chairwoman, Chao Su May, says, "Our products are exported to many countries like the US, France, Thailand and China.”

Ten years ago, nobody in the commune would have believed that their products would be as widely known and sought after as they are today. Dao women are proud to preserve the traditional craft they have inherited from their grandmothers and mothers and to see their dream of a better life coming true.