What Sets Tav Pacific Apart Regarding Hand-Painted Girls’ Clothes?
Block printing is a technique used to print images, text, and patterns on textiles. The earliest surviving cloth printing examples were created in China before 220 AD. We continue the practice.
- Textile printing with carved wooden blocks is the original, most straightforward and most time-consuming way to print on cloth, usually silk, cotton, or linen. The results can be exceedingly artistic, and some effects cannot be achieved in any other way. View our handmade children’s dresses to see what we mean.
- We apply vivid, pastel, and darker colours in diverse designs or patterns to our fabric via textile hand-printing. After that, we bond the different colours in distinctly defined forms to specified parts of the fibre to withstand friction and washing. The colourants usually comprise thickened dyes to avoid shades from spreading outside the borders of the pattern.
- We use a carved board to print our fabric. It only repeats the pattern every 2.45 metres, making each easy-to-wear, comfortable, charming dress unique. We cut, wash, iron, print, and heat our fabric by hand.
- Why not purchase our summery, multi-ruffled empire style Taina dress with its arty arrangement of shapes and vibrant shades for the young lady in your life? It is a lovely example of our hand-painted girls' clothing. The top part consists of cotton lycra, and the bottom is 100 percent cotton. Your little princess will also look adorable in our softer tinted Blush or Gardenia Tipani empire dress with short sleeves, a cotton lycra bodice and cool, comfortable pure rayon skirt.
Our hand-painted girls' dresses will suit all occasions, whether a playdate or formal event. Our fabric is exclusive to our designs, and you will purchase a one-off dress distinct from all others.

When Buying Our Girls’ Polynesian Clothing, Consider This
The Polynesian peoples who inhabit the many South Pacific islands are art-producing cultures. Artists were historically regarded as being part of an elevated social structure, consisting of divinely appointed chiefs, nobility, and priests.
- Traditionally, they defined gender roles unambiguously. Male artists worked with hard materials such as bone, stone, and wood. Women used soft natural materials − akin to fibres − to create objects such as mats and bark cloth − generically called tapa − from the pulp of the Mulberry tree. Different island cultures used varying decorations, techniques, designs, dyes, and terminology. Women employed pliable substances, including flowers and leaves.
- Designs contained geometric motifs and repeated patterns such as fish, the triangle shark tooth, plants, and diverse mat weave patterns that represented or were inspired by nature. Tapa traditions were prevalent all over the Polynesian Islands but differed from region to region. The art form still exists today as part of celebrations, exchanges and offerings even now while new artists, cultural structures, configurations, and audiences are shaping new cultural contexts.
- We developed a block-printing technique based on the time-honoured tapa bark cloth printing method after spending 31 years testing different options and various means until we found a solution that worked perfectly.
Now we can fashion girls’ Polynesian clothes and offer men, women, and children stunning attire that incorporate exquisite traditional designs and are inspired by manufacturing and fabric printing techniques from the distant past.
A Short Guide for Handmade Kids’ Dresses
We do our best to publish accurate prices, product images, descriptions, and details online. Photographs will not always be an exact representation of what you receive as your computer monitor may display colours and textures differently than the delivered product.
- We suggest that you hand-wash your clothes inside out. You can also use the hand-wash machine cycle and drip-dry garments in the shade. It’s best to fold dresses with thin straps over the hanger’s centre instead of suspending it from the straps.
- Consider our Teuila dress if you prefer a fitted style. It can be worn on or off the shoulder and presents with multiple ruffles that hang over the upper chest from the neckline.
- You may favour the form-fitting Kaute dress, which is a pretty yet comfortable special occasion style with sleeves that reach just below the elbow and a frill around the hem.
Most of our print dresses for kids are mid-calf or ankle length. Please examine our Returns Policy if you are dissatisfied with an item.

How Does Online Delivery of Girls’ Printed Dresses Work?
We ship our products worldwide. You can use PayPal, Visa, Amex, or MasterCard to pay for your order. Prices are quoted in NZD. The purchaser is responsible for customs taxes or duties payable on international orders.
- We ship your order within 24 hours of placement from Monday to Friday. Delivery may be affected by courier service delays. Get updates on the relevant websites by providing your CourierPost tracking number in New Zealand and the global DHL tracking number for international shipping. Get in touch if your order is urgent.
- Select the pickup option if you wish to collect your articles from our Auckland Store and save shipping costs. Learn about our respective worldwide, New Zealand, and Australian free shipping deals here.
- You can return your item within three days – in its original condition and with all the labels and tags attached – if it is faulty or if you have received the wrong size or garment. Request either a replacement or a refund of the purchase price. Our customer care team will assist if you return it to the store.
Pay for your purchase by online EFTPOS, six interest-free weekly Laybuy disbursements or four fortnightly interest-free payments with Afterpay.
Contact us if you have questions or need size, style, and fit advice.
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