The demand for mukena jumputan (tie-dyed female Muslim prayer cloak) has been on the rise in Palembang this past year and this Ramadhan. The item has been highly sought after by locals and tourists from Malaysia.

Muhammad Hasan, a manager at Fikri Collection, one of the local stores offering the tie-dyed mukena, said the trend began when a number of Malaysian tourists asked the store management to develop mukena that boasted tie-dye handcrafting.

'€œThey asked us to produce mukena with tie-dyed fabrics. Since we produced them, Malaysian tourists have been ordering the product when they visit us,'€ he told The Jakarta Post in Palembang recently.

Muhammad said he could sell dozens of tie-dyed silk mukena, which are priced at Rp 500,000 (US$43) per piece, every month. He said his store usually saw significantly higher sales of the product when they took part in exhibitions in Jakarta.

His store also offers other products using tie-dyed cotton or items made from traditional woven songket fabric, such as shirts, bags and key rings.

While tie-dyed silk mukena have become one of the premium products of some stores, other traders have opted to develop a more affordable tie-dyed mukena using cotton. These products can be found at Pasar Kito, a popular handicraft shopping center in Palembang.

Here, buyers can buy a tie-dyed mukena for as little as Rp 100,000.

'€œI can sell up to 60 mukena in a month. The sales increase especially ahead of Idul Fitri,'€ Iin Usri, a trader at Pasar Kito, told the Post.

With the upcoming Idul Fitri celebration, which will fall early next week, traders offering the products are anticipating lucrative business.

Iin said besides local customers, she also gets orders from Jakarta, Bandung in West Java, Lampung and Malaysia.

Rahma, a visitor, said she loved the tie-dyed mukena because the cloth was comfortable to wear.

'€œMaybe because they are made of cotton,'€ Rahma said, adding that the products were also a good option for souvenirs.

The increasing demand for tie-dyed mukena is good news for tie-dyed cloth producers.

Tie-dyed cloth artisan Sarkam, who has been producing the fabric in the Tuan Kentang area since 1983, said he had been flooded with orders for tie-dyed material since last year.

'€œThe fabric is indeed comfortable to wear and the colors are also beautiful. No wonder women cannot help falling in love with this product,'€ he said.

Sarkam said the production of tie-dyed textiles started with drawing patterns on a four-meter length of cotton cloth using pencils, followed by making small ties on the cloth using plastic raffia. The next procedure is to dye it twice and dry the cloth under the sun.

He said the whole process took around a week to complete.

'€œIt should be understandable why tie-dyed cloth is so expensive knowing that it requires such a long process,'€ he said.

The Tuan Kentang area is home to some 12 families who make a living by producing tie-dyed cloth.

Sarkam said during the past six months, he had to finish hundreds of tie-dyed textiles for mukena for various art shops in Palembang.

He said that thanks to young Palembang-born fashion designer Dian Pelangi, tie-dyed clothing products had been enjoying a boom in the city.

The 23-year old designer, whose real name is Dian Wahyu Utami, made a breakthrough with her tie-dye designs a few years ago. Her designs grabbed the attention of fashion lovers at fashion shows, including Jakarta Fashion Week and the Fair of the Muslim World at the Le Bourget exhibition in Paris.

Dian'€™s designs, according to Sarkam, have become known globally, so it is no wonder people seek the tie-dyed fabrics in her hometown.

'€œMbak Dian used to have a small shop just like mine. I'€™m amazed to see her remarkable development. Thanks to her, we can also earn a better living,'€ Sarkam said.

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