Preparing to make my first kilt.

[Fyrbrd]

First I want to express my great appreciation for all the advice I've received.

Now to the meat and potatoes. After all the prior planning I started to lay out my pleats. I've gone over them three or four times to make sure I'm not missing anything. Everything seemed to be working according to plan so far. I started with 29 pleats which is what I expected. After laying out the aprons and the pleats I found that there was only six inches of material between the first pleat and the left edge of the front apron at the hip. That is on the small side of the scale of 6" - 9" mentioned in TAoK. Additionally, I found that the sett doesn't carry over smoothly from the front apron to the first pleat. The same occurred with the under apron and the reverse pleat material on that side.

So I tried reducing the the number of pleats from 29 to 27. The sett carries over nicely from the front apron to the pleated section. Great! However, I now have 15" of material between the first pleat and the left edge of the front apron at the hip. On the under apron side the material is at the top side of the scale for the last pleat and reverse pleat. And the sett carries over nicely on this side too.

So I guess my question is, at what point do I consider a hidden pleat on the front apron deep pleat? With 15" of material there for the deep pleat, that pleat will only be slightly more than one third, by .5 inches, of the width of the apron. Is that to big for a deep pleat?

Thanks,

Fyrbrd

[MacKenzie]

Although I have no intention of making a kilt, a very interesting read.

[jhockin]

So I guess my question is, at what point do I consider a hidden pleat on the front apron deep pleat? With 15" of material there for the deep pleat, that pleat will only be slightly more than one third, by .5 inches, of the width of the apron. Is that to big for a deep pleat?

Thanks,

Fyrbrd

I’m not, by any stretch, a professional kilt maker, like Barb or Steve, I’ve only made 6 traditional kilts, so far. However, I have purposely made the deep and hidden pleats, in some of my kilts, larger than the minimum suggested in TAOKM, ( as my waist measurement has fluctuated since my 20’s ;0). I don’t think 1/2” will make a noticeable difference, and will just provide a wee bit extra, for any potential future rebuilds.