Exploring Jakarta - Tanah Abang

Tanah Abang is one of the larger Indonesian-style markets in Jakarta and is home to the largest wholesale textile market in south-east Asia. As with many markets here the name refers to an area of the city rather than one specific place and the market covers several buildings. The main building, a relatively new rebuild after fires partially burnt the market in 2003, is a beautiful example of Islamic decoration with the exterior covered in geometric patterns and the building itself painted a distinctive green. A big improvement over similar markets, the main building contains such luxuries as air-conditioning, banking centres, food courts and even a 2000 person mosque! 

Image Source: http://tanahabangreview.com/2010/09/03/sejarah-tanah-abang/

Being keen to check out just what fabric is available, I have visited Tanah Abang a couple of times. Given its size and the sheer number of shops, I decided early on a "little-by-little" approach, and have really only investigated a tiny part of this behemoth, restricting myself to the two basement levels of Blok A & Block B, and a single foray to the rather less salubrious Blok F. The basements of Bloks A & B contain the majority of the textile market (I think!) with the remaining 6 or so floors being mostly fashion stores, food courts and parking (although I going by reference here - I haven't been above ground level!). It's about a 30-40 minute drive from our place to Tanah Abang in the early(ish) morning, but up to an hour home, plus at least 20-30 minutes waiting for the car to pick you up as the traffic around the buildings gets absolutely insane by mid to late morning so my time inside is generally a bit limited.


The market itself is a huge space reminiscent of a storage facility where each roller door secured niche hosts a mini-, or in a few cases fairly large, fabric store. Rows of stores are intersected by narrow corridors, often filled with stacks of fabric, and dark corners pop up every now and then where corridors dead end unexpectedly. With my remarkably limited knowledge of textiles, I would broadly categorise the offerings as cottons, batik, fancy chiffony/shimmery/gauzy stuff, and everything else (which includes things like curtaining, suit fabrics etc.). Within these categories, there is a wild range of products, most available for between Rp 25,000 and Rp 80,000 (roughly $3 AUD and $8 AUD per metre - the latter being the price provided for 100% wool suit fabric, with very authentic looking European labels). Cotton prints, including business shirting and extra wide sheet/duvet cover fabric was at the low end of the range and I indulged in several pieces for Christmas shirts for the boys (which I've actually made) and business shirts for Kieran (which I'm still looking for a tailor to make!). I also picked up some great sheet fabric to make a lego playmat/bag for Eamon in a bid to tame the explosion of little lego pieces in his bedroom.

While Bloks A & B have a great selection of fabric, sewing accessories are rather scarce and it took some testing of my Bahasa to determine that these are more readily available in Blok F, behind the main buildings. Blok F quite clearly missed out in the refurbishment stakes, and is much more what you might expect of an Asian market experience. It is reached by crossing a stretch of mud optimistically posing as a street, although probably really more of a combined rubbish tip and sewer (I later discovered that you can also access it internally from a higher floor, but that would spoil the fun!) and picking one of the narrow, dark egress points to the interior. A few places on the ground floor sell zippers, thread etc., but most of the action is on Lantai 2 (Level 2) at the right-hand side (looking from Blok A). Here, along with the poor cousins left selling textiles outside the main arena, are a collection of stalls selling all sorts of sewing bits and bobs - scissors, thread, elastic, zippers, ribbons, beads and all manner of decorative geegaws. Strangely, there isn't much in the way of buttons - I'm guessing they must congregate in some other Blok somewhere, beyond the limits of my basic Indonesian. Being a wholesale market, don't expect to buy small amounts of anything - elastic comes by the roll, most other small items by the dozen, but the prices are cheap enough it's not a big deal. I grabbed 100 yards of 1/4" elastic for about $3 AUD and some really cute little stuffed felt strawberries, butterflies and cars for about $2/dozen. I'm not sure whether everything is harga pas (fixed price) or not, I figure being the only bule (white person) in sight puts me at an automatic disadvantage in bargaining so tend to just go with the stated price unless it seems ridiculous, but our nanny seems to think most of the material side at least is fixed price.

I'm looking forward to heading back to Tanah Abang - aside from the obvious "what's that white person doing here" looks, the people are friendly and ready to try out their English (and more importantly accommodate my abysmal attempts in their language), the selection is great, just wandering around is fun and visually engaging, and the place is so big I'm going to need a pile of trips to explore it all!

In progress - Eamon's Lego Bag/Mat

and the finished product!