---
node: garment_ao_ba_ba
type: garment
slug: ao_ba_ba
title: "Áo bà ba"
lead: "The áo bà ba is the everyday two-piece dress of southern Vietnam, a plain buttoned blouse worn with loose matching trousers. Cool, simple, and practical, it is the working dress of the Mekong Delta."
published: 2026-08-10
updated: 2026-08-10
image_file: ao_ba_ba.jpg
image_source: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Costume_Ba_ba,_Viet,_Ben_Tre,_1968,_industrial_fabric_-_Vietnamese_Women%27s_Museum_-_Hanoi,_Vietnam_-_DSC04104.JPG"
image_author: "Daderot"
image_license: "CC0"
---

## Overview

An áo bà ba is a straight, hip-length blouse with a front placket, buttons, and side slits, sewn from soft cotton or silk and worn over wide, flowing trousers of the same cloth. Undecorated and easy to move in, it suits work in the fields, the river, and the market.

## How it is worn

It is buttoned up the front and worn with the loose trousers, often with a checked khăn rằn scarf and a nón lá hat, in plain dark cloth for everyday and brighter colours for outings. Its simple cut let it be made cheaply at home and worn by everyone in the south.

## History

The áo bà ba took its familiar form in the nineteenth-century south and became the characteristic dress of the Mekong Delta, worn through the twentieth century by farmers, boat-women, and, famously, guerrilla fighters. It remains a warm symbol of southern Vietnamese life.