Mats are generally rectangular and vary in design between provinces. They are made from the Pandanus plant, a saltwater marsh plant also found throughout the Pacific and South East Asia. The leaves are boiled, pounded with a heavy wooden mallet and then dried and rolled into bundles. They are then woven into mats of varying design. The colours are normally an earthy beige and black or brown with dyes used from the mangrove tree, though now, some modern materials are used such as coloured yarn to make frilled edges. The exchanging of mats has been common practice in all forms of Fijian ceremony from ancient times.