X Marks Tartan Material: getting down to brass tacks

[Alan H]

OK, as you all know, I've dropped any attempt at getting poly-viscose or other synthetic material. We're now focusing on wool, either a medium-weight or heavyweight weave. There may be more options out there, but for now I've narrowed it down to three possibilities.

1. A custom weave. M.A.C. Newsome and Cydni from Thistle Stop both use the same custom weaver, who by all reports turns out marvelous kilting tartan. If you get this stuff is certainly sounds like you'll get the cream of the crop....superior quality material. However, it comes at an appropriate price as well, meaning about $65 a yard. Naturally, if you happen to know a custom weaver yourself, there's nothing stopping you from asking your preferred weaver to make you a few yards of the X Marks tartan.

2. N. Bately, Ltd. from England. They make what they call "16 ounce" cloth which apparently is not really 16 ounces. This raises questions about them, as in, if they can't even weigh their own cloth????

OK, I ordered some swatches from N. Bately some time ago and I started a cycle of sending them around to some of our regular kilt makers. People who have seen the N. Bately swatches (or will, very shortly): Steve at Freedom Kilts, some traditional kiltmakers that Steve knows in Victoria, Bear at Bear kilts, M.A.C. Newsome, and Cyndi at Thistle Stop. Rocky as USA kilts ordered swatches from N. Bately on his own, and has also seen samples of the material.

There are some issues with this material for traditional kilts having to do with the selvedge, primarily, but also with some specifics about the cloth structure. I'll let the above-mentioned folks discuss the stuff. Understand that there will be a variance of opinion about the material. It will be up to you to think it over, think about what kind of kilt you want and what you'll pay for it, and then chime in with your own thoughts.

The quoted price to me for this material was 12.95 pounds per meter, which is very roughly $25 (USA) a meter. Even if there was a 20 percent import tariff for this material into Canada, and it cost $200 to ship it from England to Canada, that means it would sell back to you at something like $45 (USA dollars) a meter plus shipping from British Columbia to wherever. Don't forget the shipping.

3. Material from Fraser and Kirkbright in British Columbia. This material is structurally somewhat different from the usual kilting wool, but according to everyone that's seen it, it's very nice stuff. Nonetheless, it's not the "usual thing". Some folks might have an issue with that. Bear makes kilts out of it and Colin has a fair bit in-hand for a kilt he's making. They're weighed in with their opinions on the cloth before, I hope they'll do it again. The report from several X Markers is that the people from F&K are great. Their heavyweight tartan would retail to our distributor for about $43 a meter, so figure that he'd sell it out to you and me for a few bucks more than that to pay for his time....call it about (and this is an ESTIMATE) $48 a meter. Then there'd be shipping to wherever you wanted it sent.

OK, those are our options. If you choose #1, then you're on your own. I'm not going to try to cobble together an order for tartan which while it's no doubt RERALLY nice, is beyond too many people's means to pay for it. Nonetheless, if you choose this option I have no doubt that you're going to receive some really beautiful material from the weaver and that it will make a stunning kilt.

That leaves, for the rest of us, to choose between #2 and #3. Would the kiltmakers and other X Markers who've seen material from N. Bately and Fraser and Kirkbright chime in with their comments? I know what they are, but let's let folks hash it out a bit and see the pluses and minuses. I'll wait a week so that everyone gets a chance to see where it's going and then we'll make a decision.

And then, we'll see who plunks down the moolah, and who doesn't!

Might there be other weavers out there who make cloth as well, that might weave us 20 yards of material for a resonable cost? Yes, there might be. But I did a mess of searching on the 'net before I started this, and this is what I came up with. So X Markers.....this's what you're STUCK with! I'm not going back to the beginning and starting all over again.

One last thing. Why am I taking so long about this? Well, imagine that I decided that N. Bately was the way to go. I just DECIDED that, knowing full well that I am no tartan expert, nor kiltmaker. So then I put up a blurb here at X Marks and started taking peoples money. Then the stuff starts arriving.. But wait, the selvedge isn't right! Hold on, the stuff is lighter wieght than it's supposed to be!! Can you hear the chorus of unhappiness? I can.

So to save my extremely tender hiney, I want EVERYONE to have as much information as possible, UP FRONT so that we all can make the most informed decision possible. And that is why this is taking so long.

Alan