Number vs. size of pleats

[Barb T]

17/32 is scarcely more than 1/2" at the waist. If you are making this for a guy (and not a female dancer, for example), I think you'll find that 1/2" at the waist is too small and you won't like the look of it. And 5/8" at the hips is, to my taste, too small as well. I try to aim for 3/4" or even a little more at the hips.

To be honest, I don't think I've ever put 33 pleats into a kilt. Most kilting tartan has big enough setts that 8 yards just doesn't have enough repeats for an average-sized guy to have more than 23-29 pleats in his kilt. I just made one with 31 pleats, but the person has 54" hips, and I needed more than 25" of pleats across the back and 9 yards of tartan (and it wasn't a particularly large sett).

Here, for example, is a kilt with 27 pleats for a man with 41" hips and a 36" waist. That makes the pleats a bit less than 5/8" at the waist and about 3/4" at the hips. I can't imagine what it would look like if I had had enough tartan to stuff another 6 pleats into this kilt and the pleats were smaller! It would just look odd. And your hips are a lot smaller!



So, personally, I would cut the # of pleats down.

BTW - what is the # of inches in the sett, and what's the weight of the tartan?

Oh - and the reason I said "and not for a female" above is that it's very common for the waist-hip differential to be large enough in a woman's kilt that the pleats at the waist are around 1/2" even though the pleats at the hips are over 3/4" or even over an inch. Can't be helped.

Also - I assume from the 18" that you need for the pleats that your hip measurement is about 35-36"?