Pleating options and double-checking calculations for kilt-like kilted skirt

[Barb T]

Just a thought - this is the first kilt you've sewn? Ann has already pointed out that, with a very stripey tartan, it's really tough to avoid losing stripes in the pleat taper. The "spearpoints" that result can be an interesting (although not conventional) design element, but it requires really, really precise pleating. This isn't something I would recommend trying for your first kilt. Also, keeping all those stripes exactly the same distance from both edges of the pleats, while simultaneously matching all the horizontal stripes, is not something that I've seen many first-time kiltmakers manage successfully.

My suggestion would be to choose a simpler tartan - one that you like and would be happy to wear - and learn how to make a kilt with that. Then, you'll know what you're up against with that very stripey tartan with tapered pleats.

[hmonroe]

Although this will be my first kilt, I'm not totally new to matching patterned fabric (though I certainly haven't had to do so many matched seams before!). My favorite parts of the dress-making process are hand-sewing and figuring out how to match patterns as well as possible, which is part of why I became interested in making a kilted skirt. That being said, this will be about double the fabric cost of any previous article of clothing I've made, which is quite daunting! Although I'm pretty set on this tartan, I may do a test run of just the pleating with a cheaper plaid fabric to make sure I'm up to it. Thank you for the suggestion!

Does anyone have any thoughts on my calculations for the fabric amount?

[Balaamsass51]

Wouldn't the amount of fabric needed also have to take into account the total length of the skirt? Surely the longer the more material needed regardless of all this discussion about how to pleat it? Or did I miss that in the previous posts? Just a male butting into a very interesting discussion between the ladies.

[Barb T]

"I get closer to 3" depth per pleat if I alternate a blue stripe with the triple stripe, which will have a distance of around 6.5" between them and a pleat width of 1.4"."

If you look at your tartan, and you put a

[hmonroe]

Wouldn't the amount of fabric needed also have to take into account the total length of the skirt? Surely the longer the more material needed regardless of all this discussion about how to pleat it?

This fabric is supposed to be 31.5" (0.8 meters) wide. I believe that the House of Edgar Mediumweight Old & Rare Clan & District Tartans are all finished with a true selvedge and therefore I won't need to lose any length to a hem. To maximize the length while having a more feminine 1" waistband, I could use a ribbon to finish the inside of the waistband. This is often done in women's skirts when made with heavy or precious fabrics. If I did this, I could have the skirt be 29.5" long which is mid-calf on 5'7" me.

Here is a picture of the inside of a women's wool skirt with this technique:

petersham-waistband.jpg

Because the ribbon is thinner than the wool and does not need to be folded to hide raw edges, you reduce bulk.

You can use ribbon to do all of the facing and therefore avoid the visible waistband seam or binding altogether and have a 31" skirt in this fabric. That would look like this at the waist (though perhaps all of the pleats would make this a bad option):

Enlight233_large.JPG

If I wanted a skirt longer than 31" and were stuck with this fabric, it would be a nightmare! I would have to piece together many lengths and the grain would be flipped from lengthwise going around the body to crosswise going around the body (which is more usual in dress-making, actually). I think one would just find a double-wide fabric instead! Then you could make a floor-length skirt in the usual way.

[Barb T]

I believe that the House of Edgar Mediumweight Old & Rare Clan & District Tartans are all finished with a true selvedge. I could use a ribbon to finish the inside of the waistband.

Yes - HoE medium weight tartan has a kilting selvedge. All kilting tartan of medium and heavy weight does, and many 11 oz tartans now do as well (although this is not universally true).

You could use a ribbon for the inside of the top band, but you wouldn't gain anything. A top band on a kilt is put on differently than the waist band on a skirt, and all you need to have is enough to stitch a seam at the top edge of the kilt and fold it just over the top. The lining is stitched by hand about 1/8" below to top edge of the kilt on the inside, so all you have to do is have enough tartan to come just over the top edge and about 1/4" down on the inside of the kilt (i.e., it doesn't get folded double like a waist band). So I've made do with a strip of tartan less than an inch wide for a long kilt in the past. And, on one occasion, I had a guy who was so tall that there was NOTHING left for a top band, so I used a cross-wise strip and just didn't match the tartan in the apron. It's under the belt anyway, so that's an OK last ditch resort.

And if you're making something kilt-like, and not a trad kilt, it wouldn't occur to anyone to notice that the tartan in the top band doesn't match the tartan in the apron.

[Barb T]

Does anyone have any thoughts on my calculations for the fabric amount?

26" waist, 39" hip -> 16" of pleating at waist, 24" of pleating at hip to get ~60% pleats (more feminine, will allow for future weight gain). So if I want 1" wide pleats at the hip, I need 24 pleats with 2 pleats per 8.25" = 24*(8.25"/2) = 99" for the pleating and (40"-24")*2 = 32" for the two aprons -> 3.7 yards/3.4 meters for both. I was thinking about getting 4 meters (4.4 yards) which would give me an extra 26.5" for apron pleats, fringe, centering front apron, etc. Do you think that's enough?

If this were a traditional kilt, you would have about 20" of pleats. Having 24" of pleats would look odd in a trad kilt on someone your size and would make the apron look unusually small (like the kilt was made for someone bigger than you, and you took in the apron to make it 4" smaller). Having said that, I don't know if you are actually interested in making a trad kilt, so it depends on whether you want this to look like a traditional kilt or not. You can, of course, make it any way you want.

If you decide to make it 60% pleats in order to let it out for future weight gain, you will need to put extra fabric into the facing of the apron and underapron, plus put in a hidden pleat in both the apron and underapron to store enough tartan to make the apron bigger in the future. You can't just switch some pleats into a bigger apron, because all the pleats will be cut out to reduce bulk in the pleats above the bottom of the fell.

If you were making a trad knife pleated kilt or a reverse Kingussie, you would need more than a yard each for the apron and a yard for the underapron (and that's not counting a hidden pleat and extra-large facings), plus tartan for the pleats. If you had 1" pleats at 1 pleat per sett (as per your later post), you would need 20x8.25" = 4.6 yards for the pleats. So, at a minimum, you would need about 7 yards for someone your size. I would, for example, buy 6 yards of tartan for an 10-year-old Highland dancer. That's just a comparison for what I would use for a trad kilt. If you don't want to make a trad kilt, of course, you could make do with however much you wanted to buy.

I assume that single width tartan will make a kilt long enough for what you have in mind?

Just want to warn you that there are actually no instructions in the book for a reverse Kingussie, so you would have to wing the layout, the 2nd half of the pleats, the basting, the steeking, etc.

[hmonroe]

If you were making a trad knife pleated kilt or a reverse Kingussie, you would need more than a yard each for the apron and a yard for the underapron (and that's not counting a hidden pleat and extra-large facings), plus tartan for the pleats.

First of all, thank you for your detailed reply! Let me just make sure I understand -- so I would need however much in pleating plus a little over 2 extra yards for both aprons? So let's say I want 20-22" in pleating and counting pixels is pretty close to the actual measurements in inches. To get the look of my second round of pictures:

with waist like this, therefore avoiding disappearing stripes:
WaistofPleatedTriple.png

and hips/below like this:
ReverseKingussie.png

the pleats would be 1 1/3" wide at the hip. I don't think I can get smaller pleats that that without either losing stripes or making a red lawn chair. This would make 16 pleats give a little over 21", which would be a little bigger than traditional but not crazy. So then my pleating would be 16*8.25" = 3.7 yards + 2+ yards for apron = 6 yards (5.5 meters) total? Did I do that right?

[Barb T]

I assume you know for sure that the HoE Muted Munro has a sett size of 8 1/4"?

If you want 21" in the pleats at the hips, the waist in the pleats is likely to be non-standard, too (i.e., you won't do the splits like you would for a trad kilt). So, for the sake of estimating, let's say that the waist will be split evenly and have 13" in the pleats.

Pleat size at waist: 13/16"
Pleat size at hips: 1 5/16"

So, I scaled the Muted Munro thumbnail from the HoE site to a sett size of 8 1/4" and put the pleat size on it:



If you want to see what the pleats will look like, you really need to do a composite with tapered pleats. I chopped out the relevant pleat piece outlined by the lines above and composited what the pleats would like with taper. Remember when you look at the image below that, above the waist, the pleats will be straight and not tapered, and ditto below the bottom of the fell. What you see below is as close to being in scale as possible, provided that the sett size is actually 8 1/4".



Dunno if that helps or not.

[hmonroe]

Dunno if that helps or not.

That is incredibly helpful! You are going so above and beyond in my project and I am very grateful.

HoE says that the sett size is 21cm which is 8.27".

It looks like 7/8" at the waist to 1 5/16" at the hip would maintain the same split at waist and hip as a percentage. That would make the waist 14" pleats/12" apron and the hip 21" pleats/18" apron. However, I am about to turn 30 and unfortunately expect that I won't have my waist size forever. Would you suggest adjusting the split accordingly? I'm sure you go over this in your book, which arrives to me on Thursday.

It also surprises me that we aren't factoring in any ease - is that built into the apron pleats and therefore unnecessary here? This is all very different from sewing a dress from a pattern! I'm used to buying the suggested fabric amount and adding a couple of pattern repeats to make sure I can match seams.

A top band on a kilt is put on differently than the waist band on a skirt, and all you need to have is enough to stitch a seam at the top edge of the kilt and fold it just over the top. The lining is stitched by hand about 1/8" below to top edge of the kilt on the inside, so all you have to do is have enough tartan to come just over the top edge and about 1/4" down on the inside of the kilt (i.e., it doesn't get folded double like a waist band)

I'm sure I'll have a better idea after reading through your book when it arrives! But it sounds to me like it's more like binding a seam than attaching a waistband.

Thank you again for all of the information! I am so excited for this project. I'll wait to buy the real fabric until I've read through the book and have practiced matching some scrap plaid for 16 pleats to make sure it's within my capabilities.