TEMBLEQUES

    Tembleques are handmade decorative hairpins used by Panamanian women when they are wearing “The Pollera” (female folkloric dress).     
They can be all white or polychrome according to the kind of pollera they are going to be used with. There are also tembleques made of gold.

         The first tembleques empolleradas (women wearing the pollera) used were natural flowers like jasmines, carnations, roses, etc. They were cultivated in flowerpots that women put in a stand near the kitchen to take care of them or in the gardens of the houses.

        Later, tembleques were made of fish scales, silk, spiral binding, and beads that look like imitation pearls.

        Nowadays, tembleques are made of beads in different shapes, colors and sizes; fabrics, sequins, crystals, bugle beads, swarovski, etc.

         These ornaments are named tembleques from the word temblar that means shake, quiver, tremble, and shiver. They are made with flexible material and in a way that they move easily when the empollerada walks or dances. Most of the time the wires used to make the flower or the small animal are made into a spiral to help to generate the movement.

      Tembleques are made in different shapes such as flowers like lilies, roses, daisies, passion fruit flower, jasmine, orchids and fleshy leaves. Others are made in the shape of animals like scorpions, butterflies, crickets and dragon flies. Still others are made in the shape of small birds like, peacocks, pigeons, and hummingbirds.

     Tembleques are also named flowers of the pollera even thought the set of tembleques includes small animals, not only flowers.