Peranakan culture and style #Singapore #Malaysia

Colour and pattern are the things which come to mind when I remember living in Singapore in the 1960s and although it is now a very modern city state those two aspects are still vibrantly present in the style and culture of the Peranakan community.

Peranakans are people of mixed Chinese and Malay heritage. Many Peranakans trace their origins to 15th-century Malacca where their ancestors, Chinese traders, married local women. Peranakan men are known as babas while the ladies are known as nonyas (or nyonyas) from the old Portuguese word for lady, donha . The word Peranakan is derived from anak "child" and means descendant, locally born of ancestors from afar. The Peranakans were also known as Straits Chinese as they were usually born in the British-controlled Straits Settlements of Singapore, Penang and Malacca. 

Peranakan fashion is stunning, in sizzling colours, with beautiful embroidery on gorgeous fabrics; always worn with grace.

 Beautiful embroidered kebayas worn above  batik sarongs.

In the past, Peranakan girls were expected to be skilful in embroidery and beadwork, the two distinctive features of Peranakan fashion. The traditional costume for Peranakan women is the kebaya.  Originally from Indonesia, the kebaya was adopted by both Malay and Peranakan women but with important differences. The Malay kebaya is a loose-fitting long blouse made of opaque cotton or silk with little or no lace embroidery, but the nonya kebaya is a shorter, tighter-fitting sheer fabric blouse that is often decorated with embroidered motifs (known as sulam) such as roses, peonies, orchids, daisies, butterflies, bees, fish and chickens. Being semi-transparent, the kebaya is usually worn over a camisole and secured with a kerosang, which is a set of three interlinked brooches.Beneath the sarong kebaya intricately hand-beaded slippers known as kasut manek are worn.. 

In porcelain, favourite colours are fuchsia pink, turquoise green, yellow, cobalt blue and purple.

The phoenix is a favourite symbol in fabric and ceramics.

A typical floral batik sarong

The Baba Nyonya House in Malacca

And even the architecture in places such as Emerald Hill displays the same vibrant colours.

My Pinterest boards on Peranakan Design and Batik.

#WordlessWednesday Autumn colours at Winkworth Arboratum

Dressing Cardboard Dolls #Nostalgia

One of my childhood memories are of what I did on days when I was off sick from school.  A cardboard doll would appear, complete with tabbed dresses to put on it.  Often I could colour them in first.  Here are a selection of historic costumes which I found in Volume 2 of The Romance of the Nation by Charles Ray.

I particularly like the vivid descriptive names of the suggested colours to use.

• For 1900 you should choose cerulean blue with a hat in Prussian blue.  Prussian blue which is a dark shade was the first modern synthetic pigment.
• The dress of 1903 can be violet with trimmings of dark mauve
• In 1907 cream is most suitable trimmed in vandyke brown.
• By 1912 burnt umber is more suitable, with a “vest” of Naples yellow and trimming in raw sienna.  The accompanying hat would be best with yellow and orange flowers.
• For the 1914 costume the dress should be sap green and the cape a dark Hooker’s green. Hooker’s green was the colour used by 19^th century botanist, William Hooker for dark shades of leaf.

Payne's grey

• In 1917 a toque hat appears but colours are left to you.
• Yellow ochre is the suggestion for the pale areas on the 1919 costume.
• The 1923 dress is Payne’s grey with carmine trimming.  Payne’s grey, which has a bluish tinge was named after watercolourist William Payne (1760-1830).
• The fashionable 1930 dress should be coloured in burnt sienna trimmed with carmine and worn with raw umber stockings.
• Finally the 1935 dress is Jubilee blue to celebrate the silver Jubilee of King George V.

To see and learn more of these colours I recommend the website Colors of Art  
And you must view these beautiful paper dolls on Maria Pareira's Pinterest page.