Sett vs. Stripe

[TallmanAZ]

I have 4 kilts all made to the sett and they look very nice. I have looking into having a kilt made to the stripe and in my research I read that some tartans do not work as well set to the stripe as others. Is there a general way to determine what would work best for each tartan. I have ordered swatches of several tartans but they are too small to play with and make a determination. Suggestions? Thanks.

[Father Bill]

Of course this is taste and artistic preference stuff, but my own opinion is that just about any tartan works to the stripe or sett.

Having said that, I do have friends who will tell me I'm tasteless.

[Profane James]

Seems like a few members here have used an editor (Microsoft paint, photoshop, etc.) to make up different patterns.

[Tarheel]

Having said that, I do have friends who will tell me I'm tasteless.

Tasteless, never! Opinionated, quite and rightly so (always for the good of the masses).

[Taskr]

If your kiltmaker will send some photos of the options is what I've found best to decide. They just fold the cloth. Ask that a few pleats get folded back to show the reveal, as that can give a better idea of what the swish will show those behind you

[Steve Ashton]

One easy way to test out various pleating options is to download an image or graphic of your Tartan.



Then in one of paint programs you crop to the element you want



Then past multiple copies of that element together.



You can even, as shown above, skew one of the cropped images to show what the flash behind a pleat can look like.

[Dollander]

Or if you don't have a paint program and meanwhile have the time and patience (ADD goes both ways ), you can just make a whole bunch of copies of said stripe and overlay them, then take a screen shot:

tullibardine1.jpg

I do recommend that you pair the result with the unaltered image as I have, so you can see if you not only like the pleats but the way they'll contrast with the apron. Also, try shrinking the result to see how it'll look from a distance. I tried another one with the center of the cluster of blue stripes, and while this is just my my opinion, I didn't think it was possible for something to be so simultaneously busy and plain:

tullibardine2.jpg

And yeah, perhaps Murray of Tullibardine isn't the best example, but it was the first tartan image I saw when scrolling through my Documents folder...

[derosa]

Depending on how common the tartan is a search for the tartan with google images can often turn up a kilt in the fabric and from my search experience to the stripe seems more common. I have seen some patterns that to my eye do not look great to the stripe. Sometimes it can also depend on which stripe is picked. When doing a kilt in the culloden tartan I looked at sett which my wife informed me was too busy, to a red stripe, and a yellow stripe. The one I really liked was a knife that alternated between the red and yellow stripe but was about a foot shy of what I needed. Based on stripe that made for three different looking kilts that all looked good.

[TallmanAZ]

If your kiltmaker will send some photos of the options is what I've found best to decide. They just fold the cloth. Ask that a few pleats get folded back to show the reveal, as that can give a better idea of what the swish will show those behind you

This sounds like a good option but would require purchasing the fabric first.

[Taskr]

This sounds like a good option but would require purchasing the fabric first.

Ah. I had presumed that the cloth was one that was already available to the kiltmaker.

The computer image method, then, is a good one. I even went so far as to print a 8x14 page of the tartan, simulating a length of the cloth, and folded it various ways. (someone else said ADD )