About Our Company

The Batik Butik (sounds like "boutique") features beautiful hand-dyed, hand-stamped rayon from the "island of the gods", Bali.

Owner Barb Alexander, right, works with a small ethical family-owned batik factory in Bali tranforming personal art images into the highest quality, 100% rayon fabrics especially for garment construction.

We're confident you'll love our fabrics and the garments you make from them.  "Connecting you to Bali with a single thread..."

That "Zeke" Guy

Geckos are everywhere on Bali. These harmless little creatures are so cute and representative of this tropical region. Our gecko, "Zeke" is a good little ambassador for Bali and is the creation of Adrian Raeside, a popular syndicated cartoonist seen worldwide in over 150 publications daily. Thanks, Adrian, for the gift of Zeke!  He is the COOLEST!

What is Batik?

Batik is a method of patterning fabric by using the principle that wax resists water. Where there is wax on the fabric, water or dye cannot penetrate.

Creating batik fabrics is truly an art form and has been practiced in Indonesia for thousands of years.  A stamp is made of the design from formed metal (or sometimes from wood). The stamp, or "tjap" (pronounced "chop") , is dipped into melted wax and repeatedly pressed onto pre-dyed fabric. The application of the wax requires great skill as there is no room for error.  The wax quickly dries, sealing the original color in.  After over-dyeing the fabric, often in a variety of colors, the wax is removed by plunging the fabric into boiling water - the tjapped image then becomes visible. The stamping and dyeing can be done in various stages creating either simple or elaborate patterns. Sometimes bleaching of a background color is done so the image can be darker than the background.  The dyeing of fabric demands experience, vision, patience and a clear knowledge of color.

The application of the wax to the fabric can also be done with a fine-tipped tool called a "tjanting tool" that allows the artist to draw an image free-hand in melted wax.

Batik has a long history. It's exact origins are not known but fragments of batik fabric have been found in Egyptian tombs. Batik may have first been developed in Asia. It did eventually become an artform in Bali and in Java that is very much alive today.

In this world of mass production, and fabrics printed by machines, batik survives as a method of hand-printing, hand-dyeing and of individual artistic creation. We hope you enjoy the batik fabrics we have brought you from the beautiful island and the beautiful people of Bali, Indonesia.

Photos and more details of the creative process and batik production were featured in this Summer 2007 article in ASG Notions newsletter here
Or visit the American Sewing Guild website.