Indonesia makers use traditional skills to create innovative wooden crafts

Recent releases include home decor and furniture featuring intricate carvings or unique shapes.

Suppliers of wooden houseware, home decor and furniture in Indonesia are using skills passed down from generation to generation to produce designs for a variety of interior design styles. Amid the intense price competition in the international market, makers are offering unique and finely crafted pieces to stand out. Design ingenuity – not mass production – will push the industry forward, according to Barata Sena, owner and designer of wooden furniture supplier CV Jalan Kayu.

In furniture, efforts to differentiate their products have resulted in versatile structures such as stools with storage compartments. Novelty-shaped tableware and other types of houseware are also increasing.

Teak, mahogany, pine and Samanea wood are some of the materials typically used by Indonesia's woodworking industry. Makers typically source their timber requirements from local forests. To assure buyers that the material used has been legally harvested, wooden furniture, home decor and several other products need to be certified compliant with the Sistem Verifkasi Legalitas Kayu (SVLK), the country's timber legality verification system.

Indonesia is also among the countries that can issue Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) licenses under a Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) with the EU. Having an FLEGT license means the product automatically complies with the requirements of the EU Timber Regulation (EUTR), facilitating exports to the market.

In 2017, Indonesia shipped abroad nearly $1 billion worth of wooden furniture for office, bedroom and kitchen use, according to the DESA/UNSD, United Nations Comtrade database. Exports of jewelry and cutlery cases, statuettes and wooden ornaments during the period amounted to about $66.9 million.

Cabinet made of Samanea wood

Model Cabinet Mudita from CV Jalan Kayu is made of Samanea wood. The 110x100x40xcm product has four pull drawers.

Stool with seashell inlay

CV Palem Craft offers this teak stool with seashell inlay. The piece is 30cm in diameter and 44.5cm in height.

Stools double as storage solutions

These pine stools from Kamar Kayu comes in a natural or white finish. The 35x35x50cm products double as storage solutions.

Buffet comes in different wood species

Piguno Furniture offers the Matilda Buffet in teak, mahogany and mindi wood. The table measures 80x151x46cm.

Novelty-shaped salt- and pepper shakers

Spoleno Artspace uses pine and rosewood to create these novelty-shaped salt- and pepper shakers. The product measures 12x5x14cm and has a water-based finish.

This article and its contents are provided by the Hinrich Foundation, a partner of Global Sources in promoting trade across Asia. The products and the suppliers featured in this article are export assistance program beneficiaries of the Hinrich Foundation.