FASHION TRENDS

What sets Filipino formal wear apart from its counterparts is its use of impossibly impractical fabrics — handwoven textiles like piña and jusi that are so sheer as to provide zero body cover, extremely itchy to wear in the hot tropical sun and super delicate that they break apart within three or four labadas. Yet at some point in the mid-1700s, our forefathers decided to bedeck themselves in a woven, embroidered pineapple shirt now known as the Barong Tagalog — an article of clothing that is uniquely Filipino. 

While the origin of the barong is shrouded in mystery, paintings by Damian Domingo and his contemporaries tell us that barongs were already in style from at least 1820. Though more colorful, longer in length, and worn with collars perked up, the early barongs may have been derived from the Indian kurta whose style was de rigueur all over Southeast Asia. Even as the length of the barong grew shorter over time, the key characteristic of the kurta remained: that the shirt should be worn loose and untucked on top of trousers.

The improbable piña became a luxury export as an exotic and sumptuous fabric for the European aristocracy in the 18th and 19th centuries, as embodied in the baptismal gown of the future Spanish King Alfonso XIII presented as a gift by Pope Pius X (now owned by the Museo del Traje in Madrid) and as an undergarment for the British Queen Victoria.

The elegance of the barong is said to have influenced two other global fashion trends. The first is the Central American guayabera. While this transmission of influence is highly disputed by Cubans, what is clear is that the barong predates the guayabera by decades and that in Mexico, the variant of the guayabera with an upturned collar (like ancient barongs) is still called “Filipinas”.

The other barong derivative is said to be the floral aloha shirt. While its trademark colorful prints originated from the Japanese textiles that were available at the time, its loose-fitting cut and untucked style were inspired by the Filipino manongs who were brought in to work in the pineapple plantations in Hawaii.