Quote Originally Posted by M. A. C. Newsome View Post
If John doesn't mind me interjecting in on this thread, I've sometimes done box pleated kilts to the sett, as well.

Generally, I'd pleat them to the line, but if the sett repeat of the tartan is a bit smaller than normal, it can work out much better in terms of number of pleats and pleat size if you pleat to the sett. I recently made myself a weathered Armstrong kilt pleated to the sett for that exact reason.

Normally, though, the arrangement of the pleats works better if pleated to the line, so this is how most of my (and I assume Josh's, as well) four yard box pleated kilt will be.

Hey John, have you ever had to do a box pleated kilt to "nothing" or to a made up pattern? I've had to do this a couple of times. One that springs to mind was a Matheson kilt with an incredibly large sett size -- I think it was 12" or 14", and the client's waist was tiny, only about 27". There was no way I could do either to the line or to the sett effectively, so I made up a pleating arrangement and it actually turned out looking really very nice, and quite evocative of very early nineteenth century civilian kilts.
The O'Saffron tartan has a sett of 5 inches exactly, so pleating to the sett was really the only feasible option to get good-sized pleats.

No, I can't say I've done any kilts pleated to "nothing" (save solid-coloured kilts, of course!), but I'm sure the day will come when I have to improvise! I've made some box-pleated kilts where the pleat was centred on a line that itself was not centred in the sett, but that's about it. An example would be Graham of Montrose pleated to one of the double white stripes instead on either black stripe.

Though no pleat shot was taken, there was a Muir (Modern) box-pleated kilt I made some time back that was reviewed in another thread. It was also pleated to the sett.