Ikat pattern generator

Dyed before it is woven

Ikat takes its name from a Malay word meaning to tie or bind. The threads are tied in bundles and dyed, so that the tied parts resist the dye, and only then is the cloth woven. It has been made in Indonesia, India, Central Asia, Japan and Latin America, each region with its own motifs.

Because the dyed threads shift slightly as the cloth is woven, the edges of the motifs are never quite sharp: they step and blur, and every row lands a little to one side of the last. That wandering edge is what makes ikat instantly recognizable.

How the generator builds them

Ornamatic draws a chart of 24 cells per row. Concentric bands of the main color, the ground and an accent color form diamonds, chevrons or squares. The chart is cut into thin horizontal rows, and each row is shifted sideways by a random amount, which gives the stepped, wandering edges.

Where two colors meet, a band of a third color is laid across the boundary, imitating the dye bleeding into the neighboring thread. The motifs repeat exactly, so the tile is seamless.

What you can adjust

• Motif — diamonds, chevrons or squares.
• Motifs across — one to four in a row.
• Bands — concentric bands inside a motif.
• Wander — how far each thread row shifts sideways.
• Bleed — the width of the soft transition between colors.
• Thread density and Period proportions — in advanced mode.
• Other threads — a new random shift of the rows.
• Colors — a ground and up to three colors; any palette.

Export and use

Download the seamless tile as PNG or SVG, or copy a ready CSS background. The patterns you create are free to use, personally or commercially.