These colourful fans, lanterns, and conical hats are made from bodhi leaves. It’s hard to imagine that these leaves have a new life.
For the artisans at the Ngoc My conical hat village, creating products from hundreds of bodhi leaves is a major challenge but fascinating.
"Bodhi leaves are smaller and more fragile than palm leaves, which are often used to make conical hats, so it can be difficult to weave them together," said Doan Thi Thai, a conical hat artisan.
One day during the social distancing period in early 2021, Dung picked up a fallen bodhi leaf and studied it carefully under the sunlight.
He soon came up with the idea of embalming bodhi leaves, to make them last forever. He first tried soaking the leaves in limewater, to remove the outer layer. But this process took up to 60 days. After dozens of experiments, Dung succeeded in shortening the time to just one day. The finished leaves are durable, with the stalks and veins remaining intact.
"Bodhi leaves have been used in paintings and souvenirs, but I wanted to make something different, so used them in conical hats," said Dung.
To turn his idea into reality, Dung came to Coc hamlet in Phu My village in Ngoc My commune, Quoc Oai district, in Hanoi, where villagers have practiced the traditional craft of conical hat making for generations.
A bodhi leaf conical hat is made from around 500 leaves. His first attempt ended in failure, which meant much effort and thousands of leaves had gone to waste. But that didn’t put Dung off, and he instead encouraged the veteran artisans to try a new weaving technique to help the hats come together.
Dung said: "A bodhi leaf conical hat is formed from nine layers of leaves, which are separated into various sizes. The nine layers are stacked together, like a blooming lotus." "Through these products, which truly are works of art, I want to promote Vietnamese culture among international friends," he added.
Following the success, Dung and his colleagues are now working on other products made from bodhi leaves, such as fans and lanterns. The team pays great attention to using environmentally-friendly materials.
Dung’s tireless efforts have paid off so far, since his products are greatly appreciated by customers and have high marketability./.
