About Tonga > Arts and Crafts > Tapa Making and Painting

Tapa is a traditional Tongan gift. To this day no Tongan is born, marries or dies without being presented with metres of tapa cloth (and/or mats).

Tapa making is done by hand and, as a result, no two pieces are alike. Even today, mass production is not known.

Tapa Making

The ngatu or tapa is made from the bark of a mulberry tree (broussonetia papyrifera) known as hiapo. The trees are carefully planted, pruned and cared for (for two years). Then they are cut down and the bark of each tree is stripped off, without being torn during the process.

Next, the outer skin of the bark is removed leaving only the soft, white inner bark, which is hung to dry in the sun. This is then soaked in water overnight. Finally, each woman takes one piece of tutu (as the bark is now called), places it on a tutua (a hard wooden surface) and beats it with a ike (a mallet).

The mallet is wooden and carved from a piece of the hardwood toa tree (casuarinas equisetifolia). The top half of the mallet is square, with deep grooves etched on three sides. It then tapers to round handle and is about 33cm long.

The sound of wooden mallets beating out lengths of tapa cloth is one of the most familiar sounds in Tonga. From early morning until sunset throughout the Kingdom, women gather in their homes or at the fale kautaha (the village’s communal tapa house) to assist each other in tapa making.

Lengths of tapa of 92 metres to 142 metres are made for special occasions. When enough tutu has been beaten to make the required size, the women return home and sleep on the cloth to flattens the cloth and remove the creases. The smoothed cloth is now called feta’aki.

The separate pieces are squared off, doubled and stuck together using arrowroot (tacca leontopetaloides) as an adhesive. The cloth is now ready for the design.

Tapa Painting

A relief of the pattern called a kupesi is made beforehand. There is great skill in making kupesi. A young piece of the base of the coconut shoot is taken and used as thread to sew the ribs of coconut leaves into the position required. The cloth is placed over kupesi and a dye of raw koka (biskofia javanika) sap is rubbed on, leaving an impression of the pattern. This dye is a brown colour and is made by squeezing the juice from the shredded bark of the koka tree or that of the tongo (bruguiera conugata).

The women will finish painting the traditional patterns using brushes made from the seeds of pandanus and natural dyes of either the tongo and koka sap. Black and brown colours are achieved by boiling the tongo or koka dyes.

Different types of goods are made with tapa, including table mats, baskets, bags and beautiful wall hangings. Tapa can also be purchased in a range of sizes, including pieces big enough to cover a wall or to be used for wall paper.

More photos coming soon.