Inside a Workshop in Gianyar

The workshop wakes before the roosters do. By the time we arrive at seven, Wayan Reka's uncles have been shaping chair frames for an hour, working by feel in the half-light because, they say, the drawknife tells you more when you can see less.

Eleven people work under this roof: three generations, one surname. The youngest full apprentice is fifty-one — a retired schoolteacher who asked to learn the family weave and was told the apprenticeship is nine years regardless of age.

The cane arrives in coils and leaves as seats, each woven in a pattern the family guards loosely — "anyone can copy the pattern," Wayan shrugs, "nobody can copy ninety years of tension." His grandmother, ninety-one, still inspects one sample from every batch. Her rejection rate, the family says with pride, has never dropped below one in ten.

What we bought that day took eight weeks to reach Dubai. Its number — 4 of 8 — is under the seat rail.