Behind Nene Royal’s AGT Golden Buzzer look: Thai batik meets Phuket Baba heritage
Nene Royal’s America’s Got Talent 2026 outfit carried a piece of southern Thailand onto the US stage, with a custom jacket made in just two days using an auspicious Chinese key motif batik and styling inspired by Phuket’s Baba-Peranakan heritage.
Nene Royal’s performance of Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun” earned her a Live Golden Buzzer from Mel B and sent the 16-year-old Phuket rocker directly into the America’s Got Talent 2026 final.
But beyond her voice and guitar playing, another part of the performance has attracted attention back home in Thailand: the story behind her outfit.
A post by Jeejoom Phuket revealed that the jacket Nene wore on the AGT live stage was created by Tita Style, with a specific request to bring elements of Phuket’s Baba-Peranakan identity into a contemporary rock look.
The brief was not for the bright colours commonly associated with batik. Instead, the team wanted a darker black and grey palette with Chinese influences that could represent Nene’s Phuket roots while still working with her stage image.
Chinese key batik chosen for Nene’s jacket
After searching for the right textile, the team selected a Chinese key motif batik, or “Lai Prachae Chin,” from Dahla Batik.
The traditional geometric pattern carries auspicious meaning. Thailand’s Sustainable Arts and Crafts Institute, SACIT, documents the Chinese key motif as a design also known as a “hook for wealth,” traditionally associated with good fortune and prosperity.
Dahla Batik preserves traditional batik-making techniques using metal blocks alongside hand painting and contemporary design. Its work combines influences from Malay, Chinese and Siamese cultures, reflecting the mixed cultural heritage found across southern Thailand.
Although Nene is from Phuket, Dahla Batik is based in Krabi. The connection to Phuket comes through the jacket’s Baba-Peranakan styling rather than the textile being produced in Phuket itself.
According to Jeejoom Phuket, the team particularly liked the symbolic meaning of the Chinese key pattern, which is traditionally associated with drawing prosperity toward its wearer and keeping it from flowing away.
That meaning turned out to be particularly fitting for Nene on one of the biggest nights of her career.
Jacket completed in just two days
Tita Style said its team had only two days to complete Nene’s jacket before it had to travel to the United States. Jeejoom Phuket described the turnaround as so tight that the garment had only just been finished when it was packed for the trip.
Tita Style later confirmed publicly that Nene wore the jacket created by its Thai team during her AGT performance.
The finished look combined the dark jacket and traditional textile details with oversized jeans, boots and Nene’s electric guitar, allowing the cultural elements to sit naturally within her established rock image rather than appearing as a separate traditional costume.
It is also important to distinguish the jacket from the gold and brown textile wrapped around Nene’s waist. Thai media have separately identified that piece as a samping, a traditional textile associated with southern Thailand and the Malay Peninsula.
The Jeejoom Phuket account specifically concerns the custom jacket and the Chinese key batik used in its creation.
From Phuket to the AGT final
Nene, whose full name is Rattikarn “Praew” Amloy, first caught international attention on AGT with her rendition of The Cranberries’ “Zombie,” earning four yes votes from the judges.
She followed that with Muse’s “Hysteria” during the Judges’ Callbacks before reaching the live shows.
Her performance of “Black Hole Sun” then produced her biggest result yet. Mel B praised Nene’s voice, guitar playing, energy and stage presence before hitting the Live Golden Buzzer, automatically advancing the Phuket teenager to the AGT final.
Nene’s latest appearance therefore put two sides of her identity on the same stage: a teenage rock musician competing on one of America’s biggest talent shows, and a Phuket native carrying southern Thai cultural details in what she wore.
The jacket may have taken only two days to make, but the patterns and traditions behind it go back generations.
Nene breaks down the outfit’s design piece by piece
Nene later shared a more detailed breakdown of the outfit on her own Facebook page, built under the concept “Let’s Rock to the World.” She said the costume was designed to bring together Thai culture, traditional craftsmanship, her family and her ambition to perform on the international stage, while still letting her sing, crouch and play guitar without restriction.
A T-shirt made by her mother
The inner layer was a Nene Royal sports T-shirt produced and sold by her mother, known as Mae Aom. The sleeves were removed and fabric was added around the neckline to prepare it for the stage.
Over the T-shirt, Nene wore a black vest made by TiTA Style, combining leather with traditional fabric.
The front featured “Dut Dao” handwoven cloth made by a weaving group in Nong Bua Lamphu province. The lining used Chinese key-patterned pateh fabric, selected to represent success. The pattern remained hidden when the vest was zipped but became visible when Nene opened it during the performance.
Traditional Thai jewellery elements, including a sangwan body chain, belts, earrings, chains, gold buttons and other decorative pieces, were redesigned as a single ornament across the chest.
Rare silk from Khon Kaen
Nene paired the vest with black zebra-patterned jeans from Italian fashion label Blumarine, adding a more contemporary international rock look.
The fabric draped over the trousers was Pha Pum Manchakhiri, also known as Som Pak Pum, a traditional mudmee silk associated with Manchakhiri district in Khon Kaen province. Nene described it as a rare textile with a long history linked to ceremonial clothing and the dress of officials from the Ayutthaya period through the Rattanakosin era, identifiable by its detailed mudmee patterns and a cone-shaped border motif along the lower edge.
Gold was painted over parts of the Chinese key design to catch the stage lighting, while the reverse side retained the original mudmee pattern across the fabric.
Gold accessories designed for movement
The gold accessories attached to the draped silk were intended to add visual detail while controlling the fabric’s shape and movement. One section used crystals dyed gold to follow the textile’s pattern, while another featured spaced metal pieces and round, engraved beads that added weight to both sides of the front panel.
The arrangement kept the fabric separated as Nene moved, allowing her to lower her body and play guitar without the cloth becoming restrictive. A third piece reinterpreted the traditional Thai sangwan as a gold-plated waist chain, with dark gemstones and flower-shaped decorations adding softer details to the otherwise hard-edged rock look.
Black leather boots from Thai fashion brand CPS completed the outfit.
Nene thanked the AGT design and creative teams, along with those who sourced the silk, prepared the jeans and transformed the initial concept into the finished stage costume. She also credited TiTA Style’s Thoop and Potay with completing the vest within two days, while another team member, Ice, coordinated the work and helped prepare and change her outfits throughout the Live Shows.
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