At my school era, for about 90s-2000s, Yogyakarta is a must destination for study tour or graduation. We came at temples, Malioboro street and closed with shopping at Dagadu store.

Dagadu is a souvenir shop, especially t-shirt. You consider as cool kids when you wore a Dagadu t-shirt and bring Dagadu walet. Dagadu means “eyes” in Yogyakarta slang language. Formerly, it became their logo.

They had signature design. In front of t-shirt usually had a little Dagadu logo at top left corner. At back was written by typical quotes of Dagadu. Usually, a pun, anything about Yogyakarta, or trend at that time.

For example, when world cup at USA at 1994, they wrote “Balbalan, Sepak Bola ASU” (Balbalan is football in Javanese, sepak bola is football in Indonesia, and asu is dog in Javanese). Literally, it could be meant football was a dog. Dog is a curse word in Indonesia.

However, the implied meaning was the world cup 1994 held in USA (the pun is ASU), and had dog as the mascot. It was deep, humorous, and relatable.

In fact, Dagadu was established by 25 students of architectural UGM (Gajah Mada University) at 1994. The lecturer gave a job to design Malioboro Mall. Then, they had an idea to sell souvenirs about Yogyakarta inside the mall. Many customers like their creative design.

They were good at playing words and printed at their product as t-shirt, mug, etc. Except t-shirt, Dagadu also famous with the wallet. A simple folded wallet with various color which was mostly black, with logo of Dagadu in front. It was a must-have-item at my era, especially for Junior and High School student.

Formerly, you can find Dagadu at many places, from mall to street vendor. However, you should aware with the fake products. It usually sold in street seller especially in Malioboro street. Nowadays, you can find at their online store at here. You can check their offline store also.

However, their design t-shirt was changed into plain, simple, and colorful product. Honestly, I like their old design. Their new design is similar with other t-shirt brands. I think their strength is in the pun or words on t-shirt. There are some t-shirts with those kind design, but not many. I think it is their strategy to keep updated until now.

Perhaps that is why they still existed for more than 30 years. Therefore, Dagadu became one of original legend brand from Indonesia. So proud!