Steve,

This should be a sticky someplace. I'd also like your permission to put it on Kilts & Culture ... or if you would? I think you have a solid argument here. I'm fully honest and open that when I wear a belted plaid in a contemporary setting, I'm simply wearing it in a way that I like and that isn't necessarily substantiated by any historical evidence. I've been "corrected" by some that I'm not well-informed when I point out some of the very same issues you raise. Who would want to hand-pleat their garment everyday or whenever just to get going? And where would they do that? I can pleat it and get going pretty rapidly on my bed but, honestly, that's partly out of a desire to experiment and I do not think that these are the actions the people who invented the garment engaged in. In addition to your post, I think Isaac has a solid point when he points out that there could have been loops sewn into the plaid to help the wearer don the garment -- he has some evidence there from Bob Martin but also from historic images.

The folks who lay out massive quantities of modern kilting fabric on the ground all the while calling it "practical" look very silly to me.

Thanks for sharing. Solid post.

Jonathan


Quote Originally Posted by Steve Ashton View Post
Warning - Personal rant

I'm one of those who feel that, as there is very scant historical evidence of what a belted plaide was, or how it was worn, that the Ren Faire folks may be totally wrong.

I was at a Ren Faire a few years ago and at one booth a guy claiming to be a historic reenactor was demonstrating his interpretation.

All the while he was laying out his 27 feet (9 yards) of single width, modern Tartan fabric, arranging the pleats just so, he kept saying how practical this garment was. He must have said it 4 times in the 15+ min it took him to put it on.

All that was going through my mind was -

Every morning when you wake up, what it the first thing you do? Is it practical to spend 15 min arranging perfect pleats just to go to the latrine?

I also noticed that a boiled wool blanket would have kept him much warmer than his modern fabric. (plaide means blanket) In fact he stated, quietly as an aside, that he used two blankets in addition to his kilt fabric. One as a ground cover and one over for warmth.

I kept thinking that, as he could not really know, would another garment that we do know about, make just as much sense? There is quite a bit of historical evidence that what some call a "matchcoat" was known and used by many cultures, going back to well before photography.