Beginning in the early 20th century the Dutch colonial administration in Indonesia began to explore ways of improving the economy by producing batik cloth for export to European markets. This batik cloth draws heavily from art nouveau design principles which would have appealed to Dutch and other European buyers and was probably intended to be used as a table cloth. Sadly, such initiatives were not particularly successful and it was only in the 1960s and 70s that batik re-emerged on the world stage as a fashion item.
