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Heritage in stitches: Celebrating embroidery in Lumban

Text and photos by Roel Hoang Manipon, Staff Writer

10/22/2009

Many tourists and visitors going through Laguna, the province that hugs Laguna Lake south of the Philippine capital Manila, usually stop at Calamba or Los Baños, known for their hot springs, and Pagsanjan, which likes to call itself as the tourist capital of the province, popular for its attractive falls.

But less popular towns of Laguna have charms of their own — old churches, gastronomic specialties, traditional crafts, rustic scenes and friendly people. Further east is the small town of Lumban, which is stepping out of the shadow of Pagsanjan, once — together with the provincial capital Santa Cruz and the town of Cavinti — part of Lumban.

Normally tranquil, Lumban bursts with sounds and colors every third week of September for its Burdang Lumban Festival. Aside from the fiesta, which has been celebrated for centuries, the town has added a festival, which is on its eighth year this 2009. It has been a recent fashion in the Philippines to create festivals to attract tourism, provide citizens cause for merriment and honor and promote a unique product, industry or heritage. For Lumban, the festival promotes its centuries-old craft and industry of hand embroidery, burda in Tagalog.

Fashion designers, prominent personalities and people in the know go all the way to Lumban for its barong Tagalog, wedding gowns and embroidery, which flourished only in this town in Laguna. Lumban wants to strengthen and further its reputation for hand embroidery, and establish itself as the Embroidery Capital of the Philippines.

“Embroidery has been part of our culture it’s impossible not to showcase it,” said the mayor of Lumban, lawyer Wilfredo Paraiso, who has been supportive of the cottage industry, encouraging embroiderers and businessmen to form an association and spearheading the Burdang Lumban Festival.

“This day is important to us because we show that we are united in supporting our industry, which many of us benefit from,” Paraiso, who usually speaks in straight Filipino, once said. “We Lumbeños are proud we have an identity and that is in the industry of the barong Tagalog.”

According to town councilor, Larry Butch de Leon, also one of the prime movers of the Burdang Lumban Festival, the festival has become more important now because the town is facing stiff competition from age-old and biggest rival Taal in Batangas and new rival Bulacan, and it is a way of boosting their industry’s repute.

Their efforts are paying off as the festival is enjoying support from the government’s Department of Tourism and has been awarded the Presidential Citation for Best Practices just last July. The citation recognizes the best in local government units’ practices and programs in small and medium enterprise promotion. Lumban was awarded for “providing access to market.”

It is estimated that 30 percent of the town’s 25,000 or so population is engaged in the embroidery industry. The mayor projected it is 60 percent, perhaps the 30 percent involved indirectly.

The industry mainly consists of small producers. Going around Laguna through the highway, one recognizes Lumban by the numerous boards advertising embroidery and formal wear, after the resorts in Calamba and signs of boatmen for hire in Pagsanjan. The town is studded with shops selling embroidered barong Tagalog and gowns.

The enterprise of embroidery

Very near the municipal hall, along Rizal Street, is the shop of fortysomething businesswoman Ailyn del Moral. Unlike many women in Lumban, Del Moral doesn’t know how to embroider. She opted to go school in Metro Manila, graduating with a management degree from Siena College in Quezon City. Her involvement in the embroidery and garments business is accidental. Knowing the reputation of Del Moral’s hometown, a friend asked about the process and cost of having a wedding gown made there. This sparked an idea of setting up a business. Her home has been transformed into a shop, which is now two-decade old, with the garage as a work area and the foyer an office and showroom.

On the day of our visit, her garage was full of embroiders for us to see the process. As with most of the town, the embroiderers were mostly middle-aged and old women. Normally, they work in their own homes. Shops subcontract the embroidering as well as other aspects of making a complete dress.

The embroiderers were mostly wives of fishers and farmers who want to augment the family income. Men usually do the washing of the finished products, but it is not unusual to see men doing embroidery. On off season, one can see swarthy and brawny fishermen creating flowers with needle and thread, an amusing sight. More amusing is the thought of upper-class women wearing gowns with fine details created by the calloused hands of a fisherman. In Del Moral’s shop, a teenaged boy joined the throng of women, deftly pulling his threaded needle. Embroiderers are usually paid P15 an hour.

Although there are now machines for embroidery, which are used by some shops in Lumban back to back with hand embroidering, hand embroidery is still held in the highest esteem.

“We don’t neglect our tradition of hand embroidery unlike in other towns which use machines, although we also have them here. Plus we also do painting by hand or by airbrush,” said De Leon.

Hand embroidering seems a quiet and tedious work, requiring concentration and patience. Before embroidering, a design is “stamped” on the cloth. A design is transferred from paper to cloth by perforating the paper using a pen with washable ink. The design on the cloth is then traced with a pencil. The cloth is stretched taut as the skin of the drum using a tambor, two bamboo hoops the size of regular plates, and is ready for embroidering by hand using known traditional stitches. Lumban is said to be known for a particular design feature called the calado, which are holes rimmed with embroidery. Usual designs are floral and geometric.

After the embroidery, the men would stretch out the piece of cloth on the bastidor, a large rectangular bamboo frame; wash it with detergent and water; and let it dry in the sun.

Most of the embroidery knowledge and material are primarily for the making of the barong Tagalog, literally shirt or dress of the Tagalog people, which has become the official and national formal wear for men. The festival actually was first called Barong Tagalog Festival, held from April 29 to May 3 in 1996. It was soon renamed and moved to September to celebrate also the foundation day of the town, one of the oldest in the province, on Sept. 22.

The embroiderers have regular design patterns. Popular is the pitchera, design forming into a U or two vertical rows on the front of the dress. Batok, literally “nape,” has embroidery concentrated on the upper portion of the dress, while Chinepa has it on the lower portion. Raya features the U pattern as well as stripes of embroidery. “Scattered” has embroidered designs scattered all over the dress, and a more concentrated version is called “All Over.”

The fabrics usually used for the barong Tagalog are the cheaper cotton and linen; the mid-range jusi, imported from Hong Kong and can be bought in the markets of Divisoria in Manila; and the expensive piña, made from pineapple fibers from the Visayan province of Aklan.

Del Moral said that it will take about three days to make a barong Tagalog. She said the cheapest barong Tagalog can be bought at P550. These are usually used as office uniforms. The most expensive is around P5,000, made from piña. For gowns, an embroidered cloth sells for P7,000 while a made gown is P12,000. Wedding gowns fetch from P40,000 and up.

Shops here, which according to Del Moral’s estimation numbered at least 50, offer a variety of products and services. Aside from embroidery, they also offer painting on fabric using acrylic. Painters are usually paid P250 a day. Many shops here have their own designers to create the designs for embroidery and painting. Customers can consult with the designers or bring in their own designs. They can also bring in their own cloth just to be embroidered on or just buy from the shops and have it embroidered. They can also have their dress made in the shops as they also have dressmakers. Some shops offer ready-to-wear barong Tagalog and gowns. But the made-to-order demand remains to make up the bulk of the Lumban’s production. Retail sales from walk-in customers amount to 20 percent of the town’s sales.

Lumban’s industry is a specialized one, said the mayor, unlike those in other towns in Laguna from which ordinary visitors can readily buy their products like slippers in Liliw or carved-wood knickknacks in Paete. Embroidery, barong Tagalog and gowns are heavier buys and often considered luxury items. But that doesn’t mean one cannot bring home a piece of Lumban heritage. Shops here offer items aside from gowns such as jewelry cases, cell phone pouches, fans, curtains, hankies, shawls, veils, tablecloths, table mats, napkins and table runners with little embroidered designs.

But still the stars of Lumban embroidery are the barong Tagalog and gowns, which usually come in terno with its distinctive puffed sleeves, made popular by former First Lady Imelda Marcos. Many prominent people visit Lumban for these. In Del Moral’s office and shop, pictures of famous personalities and celebrities hang on the walls. Del Moral counted former First Lady Amelita “Ming” Ramos, philanthropist and high-society figure Imelda “Tingting” Cojuangco, and former Philippine President Corazon Aquino as among her customers.

Stitching up history

The reason why embroidery flourished only in Lumban in Laguna is partly explained by the fact that the town was the center of Spanish missionary activities in Laguna and Spanish nuns brought with them the art of embroidery and taught them to local girls. Spanish missionaries also brought embroidery to other parts of the Philippines. But some historians say that embroidery may had been practiced even before the Spaniards arrived because iron needles were being imported into the country from Chinese traders since the 13th century and some embroidery features bore aspects of Chinese and Indian artistic traditions. In Lumban, it can be declared that the embroidery industry traces its roots to the Spanish Franciscan nuns.

For Mayor Paraiso, embroidery is as much integral to the town’s history and identity as its economy. Perhaps, this is the reason that the foundation day and festival are celebrated simultaneously.