Na Chiao Nature, Craft Maker
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Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
My name is Liu Da-Wei. I'm originally from Hsinchu, and I'm Atayal. My business partner is Amis. Early in my career I worked in art editing — graphic and text design for museum exhibitions and that kind of thing — and later moved into project management and planning.
Although I'm indigenous, I grew up in urban Taipei and didn't really know my own culture that well. About ten years ago I joined the Council of Indigenous Peoples and started to gradually connect with tribal culture through that work. My last job was in tribal marketing and curation — translating culture, craft, and exhibition into something accessible to the general public. That work influenced me enormously, and it's really where the idea for Nà Qiào began.
How did you start making boxes from betel palm sheaths?
I've been doing Nà Qiào for almost ten years now. Near the end of that last job, the company held an exhibition at Songshan Cultural Park featuring moonflower and betel palm sheaths. That was the first time I ever saw or touched a palm sheath as a material.
I noticed that while many craftspeople and indigenous artists in Taiwan use natural materials — moonflower, various fibres — almost no one was working with betel palm sheaths. I kept that in the back of my mind: if I ever wanted to start something, this might be worth exploring. The timing worked out — Taiwan was encouraging young people to start businesses, so I brought together a few indigenous friends in Taipei, entered a startup competition, and we won the initial funding.
The box form itself came about almost by accident. The Amis people have a tradition of stone hot pot, while other indigenous groups use the inner white part of the sheath — peeled away from the outer layer — to wrap glutinous rice or millet as a kind of portable meal. That concept was the starting point.
What does the process of making look like, from start to finish?
I think working with Nà Qiào has taught me a lot about operating within limits — about working with natural material rather than controlling it.
The sheaths fall at different times depending on the region. In southern Taiwan it's around March and April; in Hualien, July through September. We wait for them to fall naturally, then go out on motorcycles with large bags and collect them from roadsides. It's physically demanding, but very direct. After collecting, we wash them — there's bird waste and debris to clean off — then flatten them and dry them in the sun, because the material can't be exposed to moisture. After drying, we do a second round of flattening, because a freshly fallen sheath is curved and uneven.
The whole process feels less like manufacturing and more like collaborating with the material.
How do you think about your relationship to Nà Qiào?
I've never really asked myself whether I'll keep doing this. It's something I've just kept doing, and now here we are. I think of it more as something I accidentally brought into the world, and my role has been to accompany it as it grows — to help more people encounter it.
What's been meaningful these past few years is that more and more people have reached out and joined in, helping to hold it up. I don't know if I'd call it a sense of achievement exactly, but it feels like something different has happened.
Were there difficulties in the beginning?
The biggest challenge was that no one knew what this material was. In Taiwan, people looked at the dark markings and natural textures of the sheath and their first reaction was: is this mouldy? Why does it look so dirty? When we first tried to sell in Taiwan it was extremely difficult. At one point we received a batch of orders and every single one was returned. That was discouraging.
Then after the pandemic we went to Japan, and the response was completely different. Japanese customers felt that this kind of imperfection couldn't be manufactured — that it was something only nature could produce — and they actually sought out the pieces with the most distinctive markings. That gave me a lot of encouragement, and it shifted my perspective. Whatever form nature gives this material, our job is to let it appear as it is. Imperfection is its own kind of completeness.
Your work has increasingly been used in tea ceremony contexts. Was that something you anticipated?
I don't particularly mind how people use it. I think being used across different contexts is actually the best form of understanding a material and a culture can receive. As long as the object is being used well, Taiwanese culture gets to be known, recognised, and shared.
Some people use it for tea ceremony, some flower artists use it for arrangements, and some cafés use it as a vessel for small sweets. Every different use gives the material a new kind of life. My job is to do what I do. What happens after that belongs to the people who use it.
Beyond Nà Qiào, is there another Taiwanese craft or cultural tradition you'd like more people to know about?
I'd recommend indigenous rattan weaving. It connects to something from my own childhood. I grew up in the city, but one image has stayed with me — my grandfather sitting at the entrance of the village, working with rattan he'd brought down from the mountain. Shaving it, preparing it. I don't know why that image stayed, but it did.
I ended up working with palm sheaths, not rattan — but both are natural materials, and I think that seed was planted early. Rattan weaving in Taiwan went through a period of decline, but it's been slowly recovering, with more young people getting involved. I think that's a genuinely good thing.
可以簡單介紹一下你自己嗎？
我叫劉大衛，新竹是我的老家，我是泰雅族，我的夥伴是阿美族。早期我做的是美術編輯，博物館和展覽的圖文設計那類工作，後來慢慢轉向專案管理和企劃。
雖然我是原住民，但是在台北都會區長大，對自己的文化其實不是那麼了解。大概十幾年前進入原民會做行政工作，才開始慢慢接觸部落文化。最後一份工作是做部落行銷和策展，把文化、工藝、展覽轉化成一般人可以理解和使用的東西——我覺得那份工作對我影響很大，也是後來做拿鞘這件事的起點。
你是怎麼開始用檳榔葉鞘做盒子的？
做拿鞘快十年了。在最後那份工作的尾聲，公司在松菸辦了一場關於月桃和檳榔葉鞘的展覽，那是我第一次看到、第一次摸到葉鞘這個材質。
我發現這個東西在南部和花東其實很常見，但台灣幾乎沒有工藝師把它當素材來用——月桃有人用，其他自然素材有人用，唯獨檳榔葉鞘沒有。我當時心裡留了一個伏筆：如果哪天要創業，這或許是一個值得做的材質。後來剛好遇上政府鼓勵青年創業的時期，就找了幾個在台北的原住民朋友一起去參加創業競賽，順利拿到了啟動資金。
盒子這個形式，其實是不小心產生的。在阿美族的傳統裡有石頭火鍋，而其他族群則有一個做法——把葉鞘外層剝掉，用裡面白白的部分包糯米飯或小米，帶出去當便當。從那個概念出發，就慢慢做出了盒子。
從採集到完成，整個過程是什麼樣的？
我覺得做拿鞘這件事，很大程度是在學習怎麼在有限的能力範圍內，去跟自然相處。
葉鞘掉落的時間因地而異，南部大概三四月開始，花蓮則是七八九月。我們等它自然掉落，然後騎著摩托車、背著大袋子去路邊收集——說起來很辛苦，但也很直接。採集回來的葉鞘會先清洗，洗掉鳥糞和雜質，然後壓平、曬乾，因為材料不能受潮。曬完再回到室內做第二次壓平，因為葉鞘掉落的時候通常都是彎的、亂的，要盡量讓它平整。
這個過程讓我覺得，我們做的事情其實是在配合材料，而不是控制它。
你是怎麼看你和拿鞘之間的關係？
我從來沒有想過「我會一直做這件事下去」這個問題。它就是一路做著做著走到現在。我比較覺得拿鞘是我不小心生出來的一個東西，我只是在這個過程裡陪著它長大，讓更多人認識它。
這幾年開始有越來越多人願意一起參與，把它撐起來——那讓我覺得很開心。說不上成就感，但會覺得做了一件不一樣的事情。
一開始推廣的時候有遇到什麼困難？
最大的困難是沒有人認識這個材質。台灣市場對於葉鞘的紋理和色澤很不習慣——那些深色的斑紋，大家第一反應是「這發霉了嗎？怎麼這麼髒？」我們早期在台灣推的時候非常困難，有一次下了十幾個訂單，全部退回來，那時候蠻挫折的。
後來去了日本，才發現完全不一樣的反應。日本客人覺得這種不完美性是無法被刻意製造出來的，反而會去挑那些紋路最獨特的。那給了我很大的鼓勵，也幫我調整了心態——大自然賦予這個材質什麼樣子，我們就讓它完整呈現出來。不完美也是一種完美。
你的作品最近常被當成茶道具使用，這是你一開始設想的嗎？
我不太在意別人拿它來做什麼。我覺得能夠跨領域被使用，就是對這個材質和文化最好的理解方式。只要這個器物能夠被好好使用，台灣的文化就可以被認識、被認同、被共享。
有人拿去做茶道，有花藝師拿去插花，有人拿去裝小茶點當空間的擺設——我覺得每一種使用方式都在給這個材質新的生命。我負責做我做的事，其他的交給使用它的人。
除了拿鞘，還有什麼台灣工藝是你想讓更多人認識的？
我會推薦原住民的藤編工藝。這跟我的成長有關——我雖然在都市長大，但記憶裡有一個畫面一直留著：阿公坐在部落門口，把從山上帶回來的藤在門前削、處理。那個畫面很早就在我心裡種下了什麼。
我後來做的是葉鞘，不是藤，但都是自然的材質，我覺得那個因子一直在。台灣的藤編技術中間有一段斷層，但這幾年慢慢補回來了，也有很多年輕人投入，我覺得是很好的事情。