Nigerian culture is multi-ethnic and gives a lot of value to different types of

arts; which primarily include ivory carving, grass weaving, wood carving, leather
and calabash, pottery, painting, glass and metal works, and cloth weaving
(textile). Among all these forms of art, Adire, which is common among the people of
Egbaland in Ogun State, is probably the most reflective of its cultural origin.
Abeokuta is said to be the capital of the Egba nation, and the Adire industry in
Nigeria. Although the missionaries introduced the people to cotton in the 1850’s,
cotton weaving, pottery and Adire are all traditional crafts of the Abeokuta
people.

What is Adire?
Adire textile is a resist-dyed cloth produced and worn primarily by the Yoruba
people of southwestern Nigeria. The Yoruba label adire (meaning “tie and dye”) was
first applied to indigo-dyed cloth decorated with resist patterns in the early
twentieth century. By the second half of the twentieth century, broader colour
palette of imported synthetic dyes was introduced. Adire then included a variety of
hand-dyed textiles using wax-resist batik methods to produce patterned cloth in a
dazzling array of dye tints and hues.

Adire textile production is assumed to be inborn; inherited by birth and the

heritage passed on to descendants of families who were also involved in the
production process. In Egba land, the craft was formerly known to be a family
business. Parents passed the techniques down to their female children and the wives
of their sons. For a long time, people who were not from a certain family were not
allowed to partake in adire production as it was a part of the family’s heritage.

The Adire was first produced in Jojola’s compound of Kemta, Abeokuta by Chief Mrs.
Miniya Jojolola Soetan, the second Iyalode (Head of Women) of Egba land. She then
passed on the process to her children and onward to the future generations. The
first Adire material was made with Teru (local white attire) and Elu (local Dye)
made from elu leaf which is planted in the Saki area of Oyo state.

The 1930s brought with it innovations that allowed men to partake in adire making,
which was primarily a female craft. Women remained specialists in the dyeing,
tying, hand-painting, and hand-sewing done prior to dyeing, but the men became
involved in decorating techniques using stitching machine and applying starch
through zinc stencils. By the 1960s a growing availability of chemical dyes from
Europe caused a revolution in colour and techniques. This, of course, attracted the
Nigerian fashion designers who now adapt the designs to print high-quality cloth
and have transformed the art of adire into an entrepreneurial craft. This craft can
now be taught in institutions.
Today, new multi-coloured adire uses simple technology and hot wax or paraffin are
used as resist agents in place of the indigenous cassava paste. Designs are created
by simple techniques including tie-dye, folding, crumpling, and randomly sprinkling
or splashing the hot wax onto a cloth before dyeing. To meet the high demand for
adire, stencilling has largely been replaced by a block printing technique to apply
the hot wax.
Whether created by old processes or new innovations, adire today continues to face
fashion challenges, and is still an alternative to machine prints. The textile
appeals very much to the fashion conscious in Yorubaland, Nigeria, and on a global
level.

Àdìrẹ are indigo-dyed cotton cloths decorated using a resist-dying technique to

create striking patterns in blue and white. They were traditionally made and worn
by women throughout the Yoruba region of south-western Nigeria, West Africa. The
cloths were usually made up of two strips of factory-produced cotton, sewn together
to form a shape that was roughly square, and worn as wraps around the body.
Though the technique dates to the 1800s, the term àdìrẹ, meaning 'tie and dye' in
Yoruba, was first used in the early 20th century, and became increasingly popular
in the 1920s due to an influx of imported European cotton shirting material, which
encouraged makers to experiment with pattern. Most àdìrẹ textiles could be produced
quickly and cheaply in response to changing customer demand. By the 1960s, they
were being tailored into other garments, such as men's shirts, and gained
popularity around the world, especially in America, where the tie-dyed indigo cloth
was adopted by the hippie movement. Our collection was purchased in the Nigerian
city of Ibadan in the 1960s and includes a variety of different patterns,
representing the fast-changing fashion for àdìrẹ.
The dyeing processThe cloths were usually prepared, and always dyed, by women.
Their bright colour comes from imported indigo grains or locally-grown indigo
leaves, which were fermented and mixed with water softened with caustic soda to
make a dye. The cloth would be dipped into a large pot of dye, and then pulled out
to allow it to oxidise – a process which could be repeated to make the colour
darker. Sometimes after it had been dyed the cloth would be beaten with a mallet so
it took on a sheen.

Contemporary cotton dyeing in Nigeria, Cliff, 2017. Wikimedia Creative Commons.

Creating pattern Before dyeing, the cloths would be treated in a variety of ways to
prevent certain parts of the fabric from absorbing dye. This would create the
patterns revealed after the dyeing process. Raffia and starch were the two most
common forms of resist-dyeing used. Tying raffia around the cloth, a process known
as àdìrẹ oniko, could produce a huge variety of patterns. For example, tying small
stones or seeds into the cloth would create small circles, or larger circles could
be made by lifting a point of fabric and binding the fabric beneath it tightly.


Detail of an indigo resist-dyed cotton in 'moons and fruits' pattern, Ibadan,

Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.592-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

A pattern formed of a specific combination of circles might be given a name; the

pattern names often varied from town to town or changed over time. One example made
in Ibadan in the 1960s features five rows of large circles with small circles
filling the rest of the cloth, a pattern known there as olosupaeleso, or 'moons and
fruits'.


Indigo resist-dyed cotton in 'moons and fruits' pattern, Ibadan, Nigeria, 1960s.
Museum no. Circ.592-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Another technique using raffia was to fold the cloth from corner to corner like a
concertina and then bind it very tightly at various points. When the two pieces of
dyed cloth were stitched together it created a diamond shaped pattern with
alternating blue and white stripes. The broadness of the stripes could be varied by
the intervals at which it was bound. When purchasing one example produced by the
folding and tying method, the curators were told the design was considered 'cloth
of the year' in 1964, supplanting the previously popular olosupaeleso design, which
peaked in 1962.


'Cloth of the year, 1964', indigo resist-dyed cotton, Ibadan, Nigeria, 1964. Museum
no. Circ.591-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Stitch resist – àdìrẹ alabare
The term àdìrẹ alabare is used when sewing is the means to resist the dye. If the
sewing has been done with raffia then it would be a form of àdìrẹ oniko. Both
machine sewing and hand sewing could be used to produce patterns. Although àdìrẹ
cloths were usually made by women, the cloths that used a sewing machine were made
by men.



Detail of a stitch-resist, àdìrẹ alabere textile, indigo resist-dyed cotton,
Ibadan, Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.593-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum,
London

Starch resist – àdìrẹ eleko

Cloths decorated by using a starch made from cassava flour were known as àdìrẹ
eleko. The starch was only applied to one side of the cloth so the underside would
be plain blue. Starch could be applied through a stencil or painted on to the cloth
freehand using a piece of metal to create a great variety of patterns. The size and
complexity of the stencils varied a great deal. One of the most common stencilled
designs features a King and Queen at its centre. The image was copied from
souvenirs produced in 1935 to celebrate the silver jubilee of King George V and
Queen Mary.


Detail from an àdìrẹ eleko starch-resist textile with King and Queen motif, indigo
resist-dyed cotton, Ibadan, Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.590-1965. © Victoria
and Albert Museum, London

Hand paintingHand painting was probably the most time consuming way of producing
àdìrẹ and these cloths were not subject to the same rapidly changing fashions as
the àdìrẹ oniko designs. The painting was done by women using chicken feathers, the
mid rib of a palm leaf, and matchsticks to create different thicknesses of line.
Hand painted cloths were usually divided up into squares or rectangles which would
then be filled in with a variety of patterns.


Àdìrẹ eleko cloth in the Ibadan dun pattern, indigo resist-dyed cotton, Ibadan,
Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.588-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Ibadan was the centre of production for hand painted cloths. The city itself is
celebrated in a common pattern known as Ibadan dun, 'Ibadan is good' in Yoruba,
which shows the pillars of Mapo Hall (Ibadan's town hall) alternating with spoons.
The example in our collection also has Ibadan dun written on it.


Details of àdìrẹ eleko cloth in the Ibadan dun pattern, indigo resist-dyed cotton,
Ibadan, Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.588-1965. © Victoria and Albert Museum,
London

Cloths, particularly hand painted ones, were often signed on the hem. Two in our
collection have been signed on the underside using a symbol that resembles a
scorpion. One features the scorpion prominently on the front of the cloth in
several places, suggesting that the woman who painted this cloth was a respected
maker. Unfortunately it has not yet been possible to associate the scorpion symbol
with a name.

Underside of àdìrẹ eleko cloth showing scorpion 'signature', detail of indigo
resist-dyed cotton, Ibadan, Nigeria, 1960s. Museum no. Circ.588-1965. © Victoria
and Albert Museum, London

Today, àdìrẹ textiles continue to be a popular fashion choice, in Nigeria and more
globally. The techniques have evolved to include hot wax and parrafin as the resist
agents, in place of the traditional starch methods, and block-printing in place of
stencilling. Yet tie-dyeing, folding and crumpling by hand are still universally
popular methods of decorating textiles, an alternative to machine-generated prints.