Military Box-Pleats: some questions for the rabble.

[creagdhubh]

Thanks for your detailed reply, Matt, you are always a reassuring and consistent source for kilt construction, et al! You answered several pending questions that I had with regards to box pleating.

Many thanks,

[M. A. C. Newsome]

I've been thinking about this discussion , another way of thinking about a box pleat is that it is two knife pleats back to back, so of course all the forms of pleating are related to each other. The only reason I am keen to distinguish a standard box pleat from the Miltary one is that to make a MBP you start with a knife pleat not a box pleat, in other words the construction is different and the general feel of the making of MBP is closer to that of a knife pleated kilt.

This, I think, is where the confusion lies. Because when I make a box pleat, no matter the yardage used, I always start out sewing the pleat just as I would a knife pleat. Making it into a "box" pleat always involves an additional step in the construction process, no matter if the kilt contains four yard, six yards, what have you.

Perhaps an illustration would be helpful.

These line drawings illustrate what the pleats might look like viewed "from the bottom up" to give an idea of how the pleats lie (only with the lines spaced out a bit just so you can see them). In a four yard box pleated kilt, what some might call a "traditional" or "historic" box pleat, this is what it typically looks like.

Let's say that your tartan has a sett repeat of 7.5". This means each pleat might be 2.5" wide, and about 1.25" deep. In other words, each horizontal line in the above drawing would be 2.5" and the diagonal lines would be 1.25". Each pleat just touches its neighbor on the inside of the "box" formed by the two facing pleats.

Now, what might happen if you increase the amount of material used, just slightly, to say 5 yards of cloth. This would give you about another four pleats in the back of the kilt, meaning each pleat may now only be 1.75" wide. But the sett is still 7.5". That means the pleats are going to be deeper, by exactly .75". This means instead of "just touching" there will now be some overlap on the inside of each pleat. Your kilt now looks like this.


If we continue this experiment and add another yard, or another four pleats, our pleats now may only be 1.25" wide, meaning the pleats will be twice as deep as our original four yard kilt. But it is not really as simple as that, because now the narrowness of the pleat face prevents the pleats from being too deep in both directions. And so the pleat on the left side of the "box" will only be as deep as the pleat face is wide (or slightly less), and the pleat on the right side of the "box" will be all the deeper to utilize the remaining part of the sett repeat. This would, of course, continue to be true of a kilt made with seven or eight yards of cloth, with the pleats getting more and more narrow as you continue to add material.

Your pleats would now look like this.


Someone not familiar with the construction process may look at the kilt described by the first drawing, and the kilt described by the third drawing, and think these two entirely different styles of kilt. In fact, they are the self-same style of pleat, only made using different amounts of cloth, with any stylistic differences being the immediate result of the difference in yardage.

[English Bloke]

... A totally non-scientific observation.... All the ones I have seen tend to splay out (both single and double box). There is a visible gap between the pleats. I make no judgement as to why ... All I know is that I can tell which is a box or double box pleated kilt, just by looking.

Chas, of course you can.

Bit off the original topic but that's one of the reasons I like box and double box Kilts. It's because the aren't knife pleated and are not 'trying' to be knife pleated and therefore are a pleasing variation (to me at least... but then I would say that, I've got one).

Anywhooo... I encountered an ex Army, Mackenzie Modern (Seaforth Highlanders) Military Box recently. To be honest, a beautiful Kilt but to look their best, they seem pretty high maintenance and I would think you'd need to know what you were doing. It would be a shame to walk out in an expensive custom made kilt that looked a mess in the pleatage.

[RAF]

4: The tartan I've chosen,



is a 13oz. medium-weight tartan.


Tyler

I'll choose to stay out of the fray on the topic of what defines a box pleat.
What I WILL say is that this tartan will make a BEAUTIFUL kilt, no matter the pleating style!
Love the colors. What tartan is this?
Looking forward to pictures of the completed garment.
Cheers.

[cable scot]

LT,

I asked Miss Greene the weight question when I ordered my MBP and was told that a heavier weight wool would hold the pleat,swing and also require less mantinence than a lighter weight wool.Also when I put the weight vs length question to the forum,heavy weight wool was the order of the day.

But as I don't have one yet a grain of salt is proabably in order.
Anti-seamantic nice

Andy

Thanks for all the responses, although with all the back-and-forth, I hope nobody's feeling particularly anti-semantic at this point. Makes me feel less foolish about my initial confusion.

I wonder if the different perspectives on maintenance offered by Woodsheal and Mr. Sushi are due to the different weights of their respective tartans. As I understand, the heavier weights maintain pleats and resist mussing better, yes?

[LitTrog]

I'll choose to stay out of the fray on the topic of what defines a box pleat.
What I WILL say is that this tartan will make a BEAUTIFUL kilt, no matter the pleating style!
Love the colors. What tartan is this?
Looking forward to pictures of the completed garment.
Cheers.

That is the County Cavan tartan from House of Edgar. Got pointed in that direction by MacMillan's Son:

[RAF]

Ah yes, I remember these pictures. Very nice!
It'll be interesting the see the difference in the back side (of the kilt of course ) between the knife pleated and box pleated versions.

[LitTrog]

LT,

I asked Miss Greene the weight question when I ordered my MBP and was told that a heavier weight wool would hold the pleat,swing and also require less mantinence than a lighter weight wool.Also when I put the weight vs length question to the forum,heavy weight wool was the order of the day.

But as I don't have one yet a grain of salt is proabably in order.
Anti-seamantic nice

Andy

Arrgh. More to think about. Maybe I'll do the Gunn repro in this style. Or, duh, maybe I should talk to my probable kilt maker. Now I'm using my brain.

[Spartan Tartan]

What an enlightening thread.

[cable scot]

What an enlightening thread.

I know right!

LT,

If I may ask,who's on your mind for the build?