Belted Plaid pleating tips and tricks?

[Luke MacGillie]

That is not pinned, I have a strip of cloth that follows the back shoulder seam of the coat, and the tartan has a bit of ribbon sewed to it, the tartan goes under the loop and then the ribbon is tied around the plaid in a nice bow knot

[Jack Daw]

When I wear my belted plaid, I pleat one sett deep. There was no reason to it other than creating a standard to have consistent pleats. I have thought of creating loops to pleat more efficiently, but I rarely wear the great kilt anymore to prompt me to it.

[tweedhead]

I tried wearing the great kilt for the first time as an experiment on Friday night, using a 4 yard length of Spirit of Scotland modern that I use as a plaid over my tweed topcoat when the temperatures dip to -20 or below. Having never attempted to wear it before and not having the space in an apartment for laying the whole thing out like so many videos on youtube suggest, I hung it over the empty towel bar in the bathroom. This let me scrunch up a length of fabric equal to my elbow to fingertip measurement for the aprons on either end, then push the loose material in the middle to one side and smooth it out as I pleated it across. Then to put it on I went through this process:

• Stood up against the pleats with my back to the wall
• Belted over it loosely to hold the pleats in place as I pulled the aprons in front and adjusted them
• Adjusted the length by pulling the fabric down as needed (easy because of the loose belt)
• Cinched the belt tight when everything was to my satisfaction
• Put on the sporran
• Lifted the remaining tartan off the towel rack and stepped away from the wall
• Let the skirts fall down around in front, then tucked as desired

For never having tried it before, this seemed really easy and worked surprisingly well. Only took a few minutes but I didn't get very precise with the pleating, it was very rough and I was only interested in using up the material.

Here's the only picture I took, as I said it was an experiment and I wanted to try the great kilt as streetwear thinking it might be warmer in winter than a tailored kilt, so I just threw a pullover and my Barbour jacket overtop with a baseball cap, so the precise opposite of what I've gotten used to wearing with my tailored kilts (always tie and jacket and never ever baseball caps lol)
IMG_2018-01-26_18-54-22.jpeg

It ended up being eight or nine fairly deep pleats. It held in place great all night, even through several rounds of ping pong! However ultimately I found it far too cold, which I thought was ironic. Tailored kilts with a high rise really insulate the body, a fact I appreciate a lot more now. No wonder people stopped wearing their kilts like this as soon as it was economically feasible. I don't think I'll be doing it again, but ultimately I'm glad I tried it.

I haven't seen the towel bar trick anywhere before which seems unusual to me. It worked extremely well and made adjustment and wear a snap.

[Luke MacGillie]

I have, at times, like when its raining and I happen to be sleeping inside a tent at a reenactment, s folded the plaid, laid it across my back and put my belt on. Then pulled the ends around to make aprons. It works, is better than laying in a mud puddle......But does leave most of the pleats right in the center back, not spread across the back of the garment.

[tweedhead]

Today I tried holding the whole thing up in the air in front of me, holding the pleats in one hand as I gathered it together with some loose fabric on either end for the aprons. Then I swung it all behind my back and pinched the top of the pleats between my chin and shoulder, arranged it around myself and belted it while standing. Awkward but effective, and extremely fast. Once again, no clean pleats, but a strong argument for ease of use.