Phillabeg, Feilidh-beag, or "Little Kilt"

[The Wizard of BC]

Thank you Matt.

[The Wizard of BC]

Woodsheal,

I shall consider myself slapped.

My MSc is in Engineering what do I know!

[Woodsheal]

Pax, my friend...!

Matt, what do you think of the notion of early philabegs having drawstrings in the waist, as is conjectured about plaids?

[GunnHighlander]

I Re-enact with "Montgomerie's Highlanders", the 77th Highland Regiment of the french and indian war. We wear the Feilidh-beag in the Black Watch Tartan. The "little kilt" is nothing more than a Feilidh-mor with the extra material cut off. So it's exactly the same, i.e. the aprons, the pleats, etc. except it isn't as "modern" (buckles, straps) as a modern formal kilt.

When the highlanders came to the colonies to fight the french and indians on behalf of the crown in 1756, they first wore the great kilt. They quickly learned that fighting in the mountains of western Pa, N.Y. and Canada didn't lend itself to the bulk of a great kilt, so they cut the extra material above the belt off. Hence the fillabeg.

Not much difference.

[Woodsheal]

J.T.,
Welcome to the forum! I'm a reenactor too: NY Provincial for F&I War, and also 1745 Jacobite. What you are saying re: plaids and philabegs has been "standard" knowledge for years.
However, some recent research and conjecture regarding the belted plaid is that it likely had a drawstring, running through sewn loops at waist level, to ease the donning and wearing of the cumbersome item.

Again, consider these two articles on the subject:

http://www.tartansauthority.com/Web/...eltedplaid.asp

http://albanach.org/drawstring.htm

So, my question remains: if the plaid had a drawstring, would not also the philabeg when it was split away from its wider forebear...?

[PiobBear]

According to Celtic Croft, they also make the Feilidh-beag with sewn in pleats. I would love some pics to see how this is done exactly, especially the waist band and the concealed buckles.

You'd have to take that up with Celtic Croft; a feilidh-beag (the untailored lower portion of the belted plaid (single width), worn from the early 18th century (some might say earlier) to the end of the 18th century) with sewn-in pleats and buckles, hidden or otherwise, stikes me as somewhat of an oxymoron.
The utilitarian beauty of such a garment is that it can serve as a blanket, shawl, bedroll, beach towel, what have you simply by shaking the pleats out; purposes which would be wholly defeated by stitching the pleats in.
If you want a kilt with a waistband, sewn-in pleats, and fastened with buckles, that sounds an awfully lot like a modern kilt to me.

[Pleater]

Any inconsistencies are entirely due to the bottle of Schnapps left over from Christmas which I found when tidying up last weekend.

As my waist is shrinking due to dieting, when I started to make kilts for myself I wanted them to be fairly adjustable without being in any way likely to spontaneously unfold themselves.

I settled on a method of folding that is the reverse of the Kinguisse as I find that it gets caught up less on branches when moving through the rather over grown garden.

The top of the kilt is pleated into a narrow waistband, with pleats under the apron, apron shaping, etc, but all the usual inner tailoring is missing. The shape of the kilt is pressed in on the ironing board rather than sewn down, and I put on belt loops - so when walking in the garden I don't have to go back for my kilt if I should meet a bramble.

The apron has a belt loop at the end, so to put on the kilt I just wrap the aprons thread the end of the belt through the apron loop and fasten it tight enough to stop the under apron sliding down. The waistband is then in compression rather than tension.

When I need to make the waist smaller I remove the loops and waistband, then carefully press out the under or inside folds, but keep the outer ones, I then reform the kilt with the outer folds of the pleats slightly closer together, sew it, press it and wear it again.

I do wear either a long tunic or a kilt liner as these kilts will 'fly' - particularly if made in lighter weight materials. I am thinking of sewing down the pleats to themselves, that is through two rather than three layers of fabric maybe two inches or more from the outer fold, in order to keep a little more control but still be able to move the inner folds as required.

This belted rather than buckled construction means that the heavy reinforcement and tailoring of the modern kilt is not required, and hand rather than machine washing usually leaves the pressing sufficiently intact for it to be refeshed rather than entirely measured out and redone every time.

Time for more Schnapps I think.

[The Celtic Croft]

All I wear anymore to the events we attend are the phillabegs I have made for myself. With stitched-in pleats and concealed straps and buckles they are easy to wear, and extremely light and comfortable for hot summer events.
You can download our "How to pleat, wear, and care for your phillabeg" here:
http://www.kilts-n-stuff.com/Documents/downloads.html