Kingussie Pleating: Anyone have one?

[M. A. C. Newsome]

I don't think just any kilt maker would be able to make a Kingussie pleated kilt for you. For starters, many if not most of them would likely have never heard of such a beast. Fewer still would have had an occasion to see one in person or have actually made one before.

I have a section on my web site describing this style here:
http://www.newhousehighland.com/kingussie.html

The oldest kilt known to have been made in this style is from c. 1820 and is a Robertson tartan. This kilt is presently held at the Highland Folk Museum in Kingussie. Bob Martin documents this kilt in his book All About Your Kilt, and he is the one who coined the term "Kingussie pleat" to describe this unique style of pleating, after studying the kilt at the Highland Folk Museum.

The Robertson tartan this kilt was made from is not the one normally seen today, but has a white line added to the sett. More info here in the National Register.


For those in the US, you can see a replica of this original kilt in the Scottish Tartans Museum in Franklin. The cloth was hand woven by Peter MacDonald and the kilt made by Bob Martin.

Also on display in the Scottish Tartans Museum is a second kilt discovered in this same pleating style, in the Muirhead tartan (or what in modern times has been adopted as the Muirhead tartan). This kilt, made c. 1840, belonged to William Muirhead, of Edinburgh, who migrated to the US in 1854. It is only the second historical kilt to be identified made in this unusual pleating style.

You can read more about that kilt here:
http://scottishtartans.org/muirhead.htm

Both of these kilts are low yardage, being made with about 4 yards of cloth.

Aye,
Matt

[Guinach]

Thanks very much for the info and replies. This might be the style I go for when I settle on a tailor made kilt.
Regards,
Konn

[Guinach]

Interesting that the Robertson tartan pictured is similar to the 42d Pipers' Tartan.

http://www.xmarksthescot.com/forum/f...ruction-76707/

I'm sure there is no connection, just an interesting coincidence.
Konn

[figheadair]

Interesting that the Robertson tartan pictured is similar to the 42d Pipers' Tartan.

http://www.xmarksthescot.com/forum/f...ruction-76707/

I'm sure there is no connection, just an interesting coincidence.
Konn

Technically it's not that similar beyond having the same principal colours. The setting is quite different.

[Guinach]

..................42d . .......................... Robertson (modern)

Very true,
(that the colors are similar but the sett is different)
Just that to a novice, applying the 10 foot rule, it looks similar...

Just interesting that I'm thinking of having the 42d musician tartan tailored in a kingussie style (sometime)
and it's a coincidence.
Cheers,
Kon

[figheadair]

The Robertson tartan this kilt was made from is not the one normally seen today, but has a white line added to the sett. More info here in the National Register.

I’ve only ever seen a couple poor quality black and white pictures of the original outfit but they appear to show some extra lines in the sett. This may be mis-dyeing or irregular fading (less likely I feel) that shows up in the pictures or it may have been another variation of the Robertson setting. Without better images there’s only one way to be certain which is why the outfit is on my list to examine. Unfortunately it’s in storage elsewhere now and not readily accessible at Am Fasgadh but I’m hoping to examine it next year at some point.

For those in the US, you can see a replica of this original kilt in the Scottish Tartans Museum in Franklin. The cloth was hand woven by Peter MacDonald and the kilt made by Bob Martin.

That cloth was woven to replicate the original and so the white stripe is silk. It's a technique that Wilsons used in some of their earlier cloth but it seems to have gone out of fashion after about 1830 probably because of the expense and the increasing demand made it less practical to weave. The effect is outstanding but it's not something that can easily be done today because of the way commercial cloth is finished.

[M. A. C. Newsome]

That cloth was woven to replicate the original and so the white stripe is silk. It's a technique that Wilsons used in some of their earlier cloth but it seems to have gone out of fashion after about 1830 probably because of the expense and the increasing demand made it less practical to weave. The effect is outstanding but it's not something that can easily be done today because of the way commercial cloth is finished.

Peter, I asked Ken Dalgliesh a few years back about the possibility of doing a white stripe of silk in a tartan and he told me it could not be done because of the finishing process. However, I wonder now that they are willing to ship their cloth out unfinished upon request (I've made a few kilts from that), if silk lines are now a possibility? Have you spoken with them more about this?

[figheadair]

Peter, I asked Ken Dalgliesh a few years back about the possibility of doing a white stripe of silk in a tartan and he told me it could not be done because of the finishing process. However, I wonder now that they are willing to ship their cloth out unfinished upon request (I've made a few kilts from that), if silk lines are now a possibility? Have you spoken with them more about this?

Matt, I haven't but I don't see that it would be an issue if the cloth is in-the-grease. The key would be to make sure that it was never dry cleaned but from my experience it is possible to stream iron the cloth without affecting it.

Kenny's reluctance was based on his experience doing the original run of the Rennie which my customer wanted with a silk stripe. The first run cockled hopelessly but to be fair to Kenny her persevered and did it again with the silk on a separate warp beam at a different tension. I don't know how it was finished but the result was excellent but I think the process scarred him for life .

[TheOfficialBren]

A Kingussie pleating style has piqued my interest. I have a question for Matt about these:
Matt, why are the Kingussies from New House Highland not offered in 6-yards on your website and would it be possible to order one from you?

Thank you for the information.

[M. A. C. Newsome]

A Kingussie pleating style has piqued my interest. I have a question for Matt about these:
Matt, why are the Kingussies from New House Highland not offered in 6-yards on your website and would it be possible to order one from you?

Thank you for the information.

It really has to do with the geometry of the pleats. With the central box pleat, you have two pleats meeting each other in the middle of the kilt. If you think about how the pleats look from the inside of the kilt, they point towards each other like this >><<.

It is a rule that the more fabric goes into the the kilt, the more pleats you will have, and the deeper those pleats will be. This means there will be lots of additional overlap on the inside of the pleats. If all the pleats were running in the same direction, that would be no problem. But with the Kingussie style, the flow of the pleats meet in the middle, and if the pleats run too deep you run into a problem. There is nowhere for the overlapping fabric to go.

My experience has shown that this style of kilt works out best when you use less than six yards of cloth. The historic Kingussie style kilts (both of them that we know of so far!) were made with closer to four yards of cloth. So using lower yardage is more in keeping with the traditional style, anyway.