Sett size and pleat depth...

[Barb T]

Hi!

Can't make this decision without more information. Pleated with a double sett, each pleat will use 9" of tartan. The apron and underapron will take up over 2 yards total (probably more like 80", if you put in a good deep pleat to the left of the apron). If the kilt had 23 pleats, you'd need another 207" for the pleats, for a total of exactly 8 yards. If you have that much, it will work. If you only have 6 yards (216"), you'd have 216-80 for the pleats or 136" for the pleats. That would make only 15 pleats.

So, it depends on how much tartan you have and how many pleats you want.

Also, how wide is that multiple white stripe that you're going to pleat to? If it's about as wide as the pleat will be, the back of the kilt could look pretty busy - lots of little white stripes with not much red. If that were the case, I'd _definitely_ go for the double sett, even if you don't have 8 yards, because that would force the pleats to be wider and to include more red on each side of the white. This will be particularly important if your wife has a significant hip/waist differential. If the white stripes just fit into a pleat at the hips, and the pleats have to taper much toward the top, some of the edge stripes will pinch out between the hip and the top, and that won't look very good.

So, my advice is to calculate how many pleats you can get with each option, then figure out how wide the reveal would have to be (which will be governed by the # of pleats - if you can get only 15 pleats and you need 20" (for example) across the pleats, that will require pleats with a reveal of more than 1.25", not 1").

Then, do a test pinning _both_ at the hips and the waist so that you can see what the pleats will look like tapered.

And keep us posted with what you decide to do!!!

Barb