Where does Pongee come from?

Pongee comes from China, first documented in the 1700s.

Plate No. 094fabric

The honey color of undyed wild silk.

First documented: 1700s
Origin: China, China
Fiber: silk
Weave: plain weave, slubbed wild silk
Family: plain

Plate No. 094 · fabric

Pongee

Pongee is a soft, thin, naturally tan plain-weave silk woven from wild or semi-wild silk, its handloom origins leaving a faintly uneven, nubby surface. Its undyed honey color was its signature, the mark of the wild cocoon, and it reached the West in quantity as an inexpensive everyday silk for summer suits, blouses, and linings. The same family of cloth carries other trade names by region, but pongee kept its sense of the plain, useful, undyed silk of the countryside.

Illustration: a rural Chinese household with a handloom, undyed tan silk in progress, mulberry baskets, a doorway onto a green hillside — A rural Chinese household with a handloom, undyed tan silk in progress, mulberry baskets, a doorway onto a green hillside.

Named for

From a Chinese term meaning woven at home or by oneself, for the handloom silk of the countryside.

Common questions

What is Pongee made of?: Pongee is a soft, thin, naturally tan plain-weave silk woven from wild or semi-wild silk, its handloom origins leaving a faintly uneven, nubby surface.
Where does Pongee come from?: Pongee comes from China, first documented in the 1700s.
What is Pongee named after?: From a Chinese term meaning woven at home or by oneself, for the handloom silk of the countryside.