Stop Tampering With The Terno!

Bench and the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ Ternocon celebrates the national dress as the formalwear of choice with lessons not only on craftsmanship but also of its values.

Bench and the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ terno-making convention and contest Ternocon was inaugurated on the same day as the Heavenly Bodies Met Gala and I couldn’t help comparing the over-the-top Manhattan spectacle and our very own State of the Nation Address: after all, the Met Gala attendees draw upon a theme based on the fashion exhibition, while our SONA is a state affair in the middle of the day that requires no theme and whose red carpet entrance has incidentally become the terno’s biggest showcase — or circus, depending on who you ask.

“The terno, like many of our cultural icons, has been tampered with countless of times so that it’s unrecognizable already. People think they’re being smart by adding one more layer or transforming it into something else when in fact the sleeve of the terno is the very last bastion of the dress,” says Ternocon project head Gino Gonzales in between the preparatory workshops this week at the CCP Main Hall.

Cebu-based Cary Santiago is the Visayas mentor. Photo from PHILIPPINE TATLER

Overall mentor Inno Sotto agrees. “I don’t believe in people doing small-sleeved ternos. It’s one of the worst things that’s been done to the terno sleeve. If you remove the sleeves, it’s just a western gown.”

For his talk, Luzon mentor JC Buendia brought with him a pristine ivory Joe Salazar terno  — “Restraint 101” — and a butterfly sleeve mold to illustrate his point. “The perfect sleeve has to sit almost at the edge of the shoulder without falling.”

Mindanao mentor Len Cabili has yet to create a terno since the region’s wearable traditions in weaving, beadwork and embroidery are usually incorporated in traditional garments that constitute a tee blouse and malong. “The challenge of using something hand-woven and made of a natural fiber is the texture. In Mindanao the prevalent fiber is abaca, and it is tough, thick and has a body to it.”

She adds, “The terno is what binds us altogether. It is so regal. It forces one to be regal. I want to wear it as much as I can. I sometimes I think I was born in the wrong era.”

JC Buendia's original Joe Salazar terno with his butterfly sleeve mold

Buendia echoes Cabili’s sentiments and then some. “It really takes a certain person to wear the terno properly. There’s a certain movement that goes with wearing a terno. It takes a certain body type much like the cheongsam of the Chinese. Not necessarily super slim, but straight shoulders because it’s difficult with sloping shoulders. Maybe it also takes a certain confidence to wear it, a certain power.”

Gonzales agrees to some extent. “The Pinays look good in it. It’s hard to explain. The moment the Pinay wears it, gumaganda agad. When you wear a terno, it makes you sit upright. You cannot slouch, unlike baro’t saya or the traje de mestiza which is so soft and voluminous that you can lounge in it. Even the way you hold it, when you hold the tip of the sleeve, it makes you proud agad. The garment itself has a kind of dignity that it bestows upon the woman once she wears it.”

It’s epitomized by the women in Gonzales’ 2015 book Fashionable Filipinas: An Evolution of the Philippine National Dress in Photographs, 1860-1960 and the equally fabulous terno-clad attendees who graced its launch. But occasions where it isn’t a requirement or when we’re attending a formal gathering abroad shouldn’t be the only time we get to wear and see the national dress in its full regalia.

The ideal butterfly sleeve: Salvacion Lim Higgins sets a high standard

“If they say come in a formal outfit, women won’t necessarily come in a terno as opposed to the Japanese who will probably come in a kimono and some Indian women who would come in an Indian sari,” Sotto says. “More than anything I think it has to be something inside of you to make you want to wear something that’s yours. It doesn’t have to be in the Philippines.”

The Fashioning the Terno mentoring program participants in Vigan, Bacolod, and General Santos from July, August and December last year have been narrowed down to 30 talented individuals from 17 local communities all over the country for Ternocon, its second phase of workshops and on-the-spot exercises in the CCP Main Theater Lobby. This follow-through promotes not only the terno but also gives an opportunity for talent across the country to shine on a national level. “Often in Manila we think we’re the center of the universe but the truth is when you go out, iba, it’s exploding with talent we don’t get to hear of and see.” They will be together on one stage on Nov. 11 at the CCP Main Theater.

“At least it’s an attempt to convince designers to make it again, for women to wear it again and to create an occasion to be able to wear it,” says Gonzales. “The dress code is a cocktail version of terno with an emphasis on cocktail, not evening red carpet. It’s a terno meant for daytime wear that’s also something we’ve forgotten. If you look at the SONA, you see trains and beadwork all in the middle of the day so it kind of gets ridiculous — why are they wearing evening gowns? We’ve lost a sense of propriety.”