Can 6 pleats work on a box pleat kilt?

**Tartan Tess** · 27th October 12, 04:23 AM

I have 4 yards of ancient Napier tartan to make into a box pleat kilt for a man 38"waist, 39"hips.
The sett size is less than 6" and can use either a nice blue area with a white cross line to pleat, or a big white
larger area with lots of stripes in it.
Pleating every one of the blue area makes pleats too small and pleating every other makes 3" and 3 1/4"
pleats; but only 6 of them.
If I pleat it every one and a half I will have this bright white pleat that makes me think of skunk stripes across the back.
I have tried every way I can think of to get more tartan for one more blue pleat but it will make the deep and inverted pleats too
shallow.
do you think 6 nice pleats are will look good or should I do the "Sett" pattern?
sorry no picture yet
Teri

**M. A. C. Newsome** · 27th October 12, 05:00 AM

Teri,

Yes, it can work. I've made a few four yard box pleated kilts with only six pleats in the back. I wouldn't go any fewer -- to me, six is my personal minimum.

One of the earliest surviving tailored civilian kilts is a four yard box pleated kilt with only six wide pleats, c. 1800. It's in the MacDuff tartan, formally displayed in the Scottish Tartans Museum (Franklin, NC) but recently returned to Scotland and now at the Scottish Tartans Authority HQ in Crieff. You can see a photo gallery of the kilt here:
http://scottishtartans.org/macduff_kilt.htm