Dai Clothes

The Dai men often wear a short collarless narrow-sleeved jacket with buttons on the right and trousers made of white or black cloth. They often dress in white. In cold days, men wear felts, and wrap their heads with white or black cloth. Short jackets with narrow sleeves and pailform skirts are the main clothes for women. Women often wear white, sky-blue or pink tight undergarments with a collared short shirt over them that button either down the front or on the right. The shirt has long, slim sleeves that wrap tightly around the arms. Many Dai women coil their long hair into a bun on top of their heads, fixing it with a single beautiful crescent-shaped comb or wrap it with colored headcloth for decoration.

In some places of the Dai ethnic minority, unmarried women wear white or blue short shirts with buttons down the front and long trousers, with a girdle around their waists. After marriage, they wear short shirts and black pailform skirts without a girdle around their waists. Costumes of Dai women in inland areas and border areas are similar, but have regional features. Dai ethnic minority is usually called as the People with Colored Waists or the People with Wide Sleeves.