Pingtung Entrepreneur Couple Use Betel Nut Dye in Fashion
Betel Nut Dyes: A New Wave in Taiwan’s Fashion Scene
REPORTER:
The clothing in this shop looks like it could come from any of the major fashion brands, but it’s actually part of a social and ecological experiment. The cloth all comes from the rural interior of Taiwan’s tropical far south, and all the dyes come from an unlikely source.
REPORTER:
The betel nut is best known in Asia as a chewed stimulant, leaving the mouth stained a bright red and damaging the health in the long-term. But husband-and-wife entrepreneurs Wang I-fan and Huang Wan-chieh have found in them an excellent source of coloring—able to create a range of subtle hues that are perfect for fashion.
REPORTER:
The idea to start experimenting with betel nut pigments began in 2021, at the height of the COVID pandemic, when the couple moved back from Taipei to their hometown of Neipu in Pingtung County. Betel nut trees are plentiful here, but the idea of using them to dye cloth struck many locals as bizarre.
Wang I-fan (ENTREPRENEUR):
Their reaction was “Why are you doing this? Betel nuts are for cutting, selling and chewing. Why are you making them into dyes? What can you do with the dyed cloth? How much can you sell the things you make for? Who are you going to sell to?” There were lots of question marks around this thing.
REPORTER:
Still, the research went on.
Wang I-fan (ENTREPRENEUR):
We spent a lot of time experimenting to find out how many colors of dye you can get out of the betel nut, recording how you conntrol [the process] and using [an instrument called] a colorimeter when making color swatches to scientifically prove the colors.
REPORTER:
It took three years of experiments with temperature and water characteristics, but eventually, they’d worked out how to get 514 different shades from this one source—fallen betel nuts.
REPORTER:
But even now they know how to do it, extracting all these dyes is still hard work. The nuts need to dry out—then the cores need to be extracted, crushed and boiled. The whole process takes five months.
REPORTER:
But the result is eco-friendly clothing, bags, pillow cases and accessories—and the prospect of new jobs in a rural, aging part of the country.
REPORTER:
The couple later found out that they actually weren’t the first to think of betel nut dyes. That honor goes to early modern Japan. Still, they’re proud to have independently rediscovered the technique—and of making it perhaps a part of Taiwan’s modern culture.
Huang Wan-chieh (ENTREPRENEUR):
I think color can serve as a carrier for culture. We use the red of betel nut with the brown of the earty. We’re growing Taiwanese colors on Taiwanese soil.
REPORTER:
With a sense of both color and style, they’re putting a local product onto the mass market—and carving out a new niche in the fashion world.
