A History of Lace-bark Cloth in Jamaica
Posted on February 01 2026
On May 5, 1494, Christopher Columbus and his crew became the first Europeans to encounter the island known to the Indigenous Taíno as Xaymaca. This Taíno word would become the name that we know the island by today, Jamaica. The Spanish arrived in search of gold & silver and when that failed, they stayed and established agricultural plantations worked by enslaved people to help support their wider conquests in North and South America. Yet Jamaica had, and continues to have, far more to offer than resources to be extracted by those in power. Among the many, many secrets held by Jamaica’s forests is Lagetta lagetto, the lace-bark tree. An unassuming, evergreen tree with ovate leaves and white, bell-shaped flowers, this tree would provide dignity and a degree of autonomy for generations of enslaved Africans and their descents, only to eventually fade aware from both common knowledge and the forests due to its eventual overuse.
Although the Taíno fiercely resisted, the Spanish ultimately defeated them and forced survivors into enslavement. Within fifty years of Columbus and his crew’s arrival, Spanish colonization effectively committed genocide against the Taíno through violence, starvation and, less directly, by spreading European diseases against which they had no immunity. As the Taíno population declined, the Spanish concluded that additional enslaved labor was required. By around 1513, they began forcibly transporting enslaved people from Western and Central Africa to Jamaica. During the period when Taíno communities still existed alongside newly arrived Africans, cultural exchange took place among these enslaved peoples. It is likely that during this relatively brief moment in history, enslaved Africans learned about lace-bark and other useful plants from Taíno knowledge of the land.
In 1655, the English captured Jamaica during Anglo-Spanish War and began their own colonization of the island. Like the Spanish, English colonists depended heavily on enslaved labor to sustain plantations and other enterprises. English enslavers in Jamaica were required by law to provide minimum clothing for their slaves, but the minimum was hardly sufficient for people that were forced to engage in hard labor. The law stated that slaves had to be provided with, “as much Oznaburgh [a rough, plain-weave cotton fabric] as will make two frocks, and as much woolen stuff as will make a great coat.” Enslaved Jamaicans had few options to gain additional clothing. They might exchange labor or sex during any available free time, purchase clothing with money earned from selling produce from their provision grounds, or make clothing themselves from harvested from freely available, locally harvested materials.
The first enslaved Africans would have brought with them knowledge of barkcloth production from trees such as mutuba and kilundu in Western and Central Africa. Although there is no documentation, it is thought that that some of the first Africans to arrive in Jamaica sought out, with Taíno guidance, local trees that could provide similar fibers. At least two Jamaican trees were used for barkcloth: mahoe (Hibiscus elatus) and lace-bark (Lagetta lagetto), also known as the “gauze tree.”
While Mahoe barkcloth was strong, it was also coarse and scratchy. Lace-bark, however, was quite fine and remarkably durable. Lace-bark cloth was made by harvesting bark from cut branches or from the trunk itself. When bark was removed vertically, without girdling the tree, the tree could survive. However, lace-bark trees were abundant in the early colonial period, and it was more common to strip the trunk entirely, a practice that killed the tree, or to simply cut down the tree. The inner bark was soaked in water and carefully stretched outward, separating it into a cloth with many fine, overlapping filaments. This process produced a lace-like cloth that could expand to as much as five times the width of the original piece of bark. Lace-bark cloth could be dyed, although it was most often used in its natural white, undyed state. It was also durable enough to withstand washing, with some European writers remarking that it was similar to linen in strength.
Although other species of lace-bark grow elsewhere in the Caribbean, including Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic, the material was not used as extensively for cloth as it was in Jamaica. Jamaican lace-bark was fashioned into various clothing and home goods. Entire dresses and other clothing were made from it, and even when layered, the fabric allowed air to circulate in a hot, humid climate. Lace-bark was also used for items beyond everyday clothing, including bonnets, shawls, wedding veils, and fans. And it was used to decorate clothing as well. Since imported lace was prohibitively expensive, lace-bark filled that niche for many enslaved Jamaicans, trimming clothing, shoes, and hats. Beyond apparel, it was used to make cordage, rope, baskets, and hammocks. Tragically, it was also used to make whips wielded by enslavers against the enslaved.
Lace-bark trees require a specific environment to thrive. They grow in limestone forests above 1,500 feet, often rooted in rock crevices with little soil, and require rainfall of at least 75 inches per year. These areas were remote and unsettled by European colonizers. So, it is perhaps no surprise that the Jamaicans who escaped slavery settled in these mountains and forests. Their former enslavers called them by the common names for fugitives in the Caribbean: cimarrónes in Spanish or marron in French. These names were adopted and transformed, and in common Jamaican speech these self-freed communities became known as the Maroons. Enslaved Jamaicans harvested lace-bark themselves, but they are also known to have traded with Maroon communities for lace-bark and other forest goods. No doubt enslaved Jamaicans also passed on essential intelligence to the Maroons, who fought a multi-generational campaign of resistance against the English as they tried to re-enslave them.
On August 1st, 1838, slavery was officially abolished in Jamaica. Over the next several decades, a growing middle class began to earn enough money to purchase textiles and clothing from overseas As a result, lace-bark clothing fell out of everyday use, not only because new materials were available, but also because lace-bark was closely associated with the experience of slavery. Instead, lace-bark cloth shifted towards Jamaica’s emerging tourist industry. Lace-bark reached broader European awareness with the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London, England. During the Great Exhibition, Queen Victoria was presented with dress made from lace-bark. Suddenly, lace-bark was in demand by a fascinated Western Europe. Made into doilies decorated with dried ferns that would become known as fern work, fans, and other such portable souvenirs, European and other tourists would bring them home as examples of Jamaican handicrafts.
This surge in popularity proved devastating to Jamaica’s lace-bark trees. By 1890, the lace-bark crafting industry had collapsed due to overharvesting. This decline was made worse by mining operations and population growth that required clearing forests for more space and building materials. In 1906, Jamaican officials reported that they believed that less than a dozen lace-bark trees remained. Although the species eventually began to recover, it faced overharvesting pressures again between the 1960s and the1980s when a revival of Jamaican crafting traditions renewed interest in lace-bark crafts. Once again, the tree population drastically declined. Today, lace-bark trees still grow in Jamaica’s limestone forests, but the species is considered threatened.
While some governmental organizations in Jamaica promote reforestation and the restoration of native forest ecosystems, there are currently none that specifically promote the reintroduction of lace-bark trees to its historic habitats. Additionally, it continues to be threatened by limestone and bauxite mining. These mining operations occur in same habitats the lace-bark trees require and as a result, the already limited places that lace-bark trees can grow continue to shrink.
The story of Jamaica’s lace-bark tree is inseparable from the history of enslavement, resistance, creativity, and survival on the island. What began as a means of meeting basic human needs was later transformed into art and traditional craft, shaped by Indigenous knowledge and African skill. Unfortunately, its repeated cycles of use over the centuries mimic the very patterns of colonialism that created its necessity: exploitation, decline, and fragile recovery. Sharing the history of lace-bark with fiber arts and crafting communities can encourage not only renewed attention to its conservation, but also a deeper reckoning with the legacies of colonialism and slavery. Remembering lace-bark’s history also reminds us that material traditions depend upon the landscapes that sustain them, and that protecting those landscapes also protects the histories woven from them.
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