"A Piece of Cloth," Sunday at Ward Centre and Ward Warehouse amphitheater, is a Temari-sponsored event that will demonstrate why fabrics are tangible expressions of history, rituals and legends.

More than just a piece of cloth, really. Fabrics make clothes, purses and more.

Hands-on demos of printing with bamboo stamps and dyes, plus tips on how to wrap Indonesian batik, sarong-style, will be shared at the event. Think outside the box: These elements can easily be adapted to Christmas motifs as the holidays loom.

Take the Japanese furoshiki: It's a square of fabric, like a large napkin, that "wraps" a gift (sweets, for example). "It's the ultimate 'green' wrapping paper, traditionally used to simply carry the gift, then taken back when the gift was given," said Ann Asakura, Temari honcho. "Now we often give the cloth wrapper with the gift, and it keeps on being used."

Kapa, or tapa, is the Hawaiian cloth, traditionally beaten from the inner bark of wauke, or paper mulberry, and decorated with incised bamboo stamps. Kapa lives on, in kihei, the cloaklike decorated fabric draped over the shoulders, to designate rank or nobility.

The batik sarong, an Indonesian invention, is derived from dying fabrics, then imposing waxed patterns — and the garment traditionally "reflected messengers of social status and importance to the community," said Asakura. Some patterns are strictly for males; and a sarong generally is pleated and tucked, akin to the skirts of Hawaiian pa'u riders.