Three Young Girls Outside On The Field With Pareos

In contemporary Tahitian the right word is pāreu (singular: te pāreu, plural: te mau pāreu), with the pronunciation of the word with a long a (hold the sound for two beats rather than just one) and the e and u pronounced separately, rather than slurred into a diphthong. It is not clear where the variant pareo comes from. It might be an old dialectic variant or an early explorers' misinterpretation. But both terms were already used in the 19th century (the Dutch geographic magazine De Aarde en haar Volken of 1887 had a few Southseas articles, some of them using pāreu, others pareo). Nowadays, however, pareo can be considered as the English-language form of the word (plural pareos), much less likely subject to mispronunciation.
Styles
The Tahitian pāreu are among the most colourful and bright of the Pacific. Originally flower patterns, the hibiscus flowers in particular, or traditional tapa patterns, were printed in bright colours on a cotton sheet of about 90 or 120 cm wide and 180 cm long, made in China. Nowadays they are also made in Tahiti itself and dye painting with varying colours is popular as well.