Hemming a kilt

[Dukeof Kircaldy]

I just received a used kilt I bought on eBay. I'm guessing it's a 14 or 16 oz 8 yarder. It fits pretty well, other than a little long.

Problem. Somebody shortened the kilt by just cutting off the bottom.

Can this be hemmed without redoing the kilt? Who can do this? A local tailor or a kiltmaker? About how much?

I figure a hem and this would be as close to made for me as could be.

[ThreadBbdr]

A local tailor should be able to hem it. I know Barb's talked about hemming her band's 16oz kilts. If I were doing it, I would probably clean finish the edge (either serge or zigzag) then turn up the hem just once and stitch by hand, not machine.

Don't forget to have them take a slightly deeper hem in the underapron and other places where the kiliting selvage would ordinarily be turned up just a touch to keep the lower edges from showing.

You'll probably need to baste and re-set the bottoms of the pleats with steam and (Lots of) pressure because that inch or so that is turned up will now have the 'crease' going in the opposite direction (ins become outs and vice versa). Lucky, wool doesn't mind that (with a little steam encouragement). I would do it myself instead of asking the tailor to do it because they will need the pleats open to hem, and you need them basted to press. And most tailors (at least the ones around here) have no idea what to do with a kilt.

To bad you aren't local to me, or I'd offer to do it for you.

[Dukeof Kircaldy]

I could always mail it to you for your opinion.

The problem is that this sounds as if it may require more hem than the kilt could take. I'd say there is a half an inch which needs to be taken up at most, but I don't know if this is too little. It is a 24" length and the shortest I could go would be 23". 23 1/2 looks good.

Also, the person who shortened it hacked the bottom of the kilt.

[Barb T]

You could probably actually take it up just 1/2", but that would be the bare minimum.

Just went to the eBay link you posted. Did they not really mention that the kilt had been hacked off at the bottom? And still charged you about $250?? Or did miss something?

[Dukeof Kircaldy]

It was for charity, Barb! Otherwise I would be screaming.

And I wouldn't have bid as highly.

Here is me in the kilt. Forgive the picture as I just took it to post on this thread. I hope it gives you an idea of how it looks on me.


This is me in a 23" long kilt for comparison. It is the same kilt I am wearing in my Avatar.

[Alan H]

I would very carefully cut off the damaged part and then serge the raw edge with a sewing machine. If you don't have access to a serger, or a sewing machine with a serging stitch, you can run a double or triple line of zig-zags along the raw edge. At least one of those lines of zig-zag should be fairly wide.

Turn up the hem about 1/2 an inch. You might be able to do 3/8ths of an inch, but much less than that is going to be tough and require a lot of patience. I'd then press the hem down, HARD with a steam iron, and pin it. Then I would hand-sew a blind stitch along the bottom, to hold the hem in, and then press again. I haven't used a machine-done blind stitch, so I can't comment to that, but hand-sewing a blind stitch along 20-something feet of hem will be 3-4 hours work. I don't know what the going rate is in your neighborhood, but I would expect to pay a tailor about $20 an hour for this, which means it would be about $60-$80 to hand-sew the hem.

The serging of the raw edge will be quicker, probably an hours work. All in all, I guess this modification will cost roughly $100 if you hire it out.

And then I 'd wear it.

[Barb T]

I actually wouldn't use a blind stitch for this. A kilt hem is typically done with a different stitch that boils down to a catch stitch. It's 6:30 in the morning and I'm in Roanoke Airport and I'm a bit brain dead and I'm drawing a complete blank on the name of the stitch. Anyhow, I'll post a pic when I get home. The stitch that I can't remember the name of produces a hem with a little more "give" and a little less tendency to make a ridge at the bottom of the kilt.

And I definitely would hem the kilt, if only to keep the bottom edge from getting worse and raveling until you can't do anything successful to fix it.

Sorry my brain is mush this morning! Coffee isn't helping.....

[Barb T]

The herringbone stitch. My brain was mush this morning. Here it is:

[Dukeof Kircaldy]

Thank you, Barb!

[Alan H]

The herringbone stitch. My brain was mush this morning. Here it is:

If you did a herringbone where you caught just a few threads on each pass on the "outside" of the kilt, it would work the same, but Barb is right, the herringbone has more flexibility to it than a straight blind stitch. I usually do a "canted blind stitch", which is a term I just made to suggest that the stitch isn't straight across, it's "tilted".