Work Kilt ver 0.3 Alpha

[Perldog007]

This is my third attempt at making a casual kilt. Wanted a tough casual kilt that would do for knocking about in the warehouse, woodlot and such.

Material is 10 oz. cotton duck (Sp?)

The same qualities that made me a passable perl programmer (laziness, impatience and hubris) are anathema to kiltmaking. Studied Alan's excellent Xkilt guide before trying this. Since I am friggin huge about the gut, made a few design guesses that turned out to be less than optimal.

The bright side is that I have enough of this material to do it all again. Will be using Alan's design for the waistband and including under apron pleats in the next one. For some reason I thought that eliminating the under apron pleats would make it hang better.

"Kilt Pin" is actually a good ol'e Tandy Leather Co. Concho in a grommet.


First attempt at box pleating, definitely easier for me to work with than knife pleats.

Here are a couple of pics:

http://www.doublebad.net/CASUAL.JPG

The money shot:

http://www.doublebad.net/CPLEATS.JPG

I am happy with the length, wanted it to the bottom of the knee, and the fell. The waistband is 2" this time and the beltloops are improved. Am estatic that the kilt attempt looked this well after a trip through washer and dryer.

Still plenty of room for improvement. Gaining confidence with the sewing machine and a little confidence is a dangerous thing.

Stand by for version 0.4 alpha.

As always, your suggestions are appreciated. Really having trouble with that apron over the gut but I will figure it out.

[Pleater]

I think that you are being a bit hard on yourself - except for missing out the under apron pleats - they are there for a reason - but even with that, it is a fair do, from what I can see.

You might tweek the design a little by not sewing the fell quite so far down - if you feel it best to have that length at the back then you could reduce the length of the sewing on the last pleats each side, to allow the aprons to hang loose from higher up.

Tailoring or shaping the front will probably give you a lot of satisfaction in the way the kilt looks for not that much effort - I mean that it will only require a bit of adjustment to give a flatter (and maybe more flattering look)

I wonder if making the aprons without a separate waist band would help with the fitting. It would mean cutting the back waist so as to leave the aprons and under apron pleats with enough material to make up the height and a fold over to match the band when attached.

You could then add in darts, shaping of the edges of the apron, tilting the aprons up and curving the top edge - so as to get a good fit.

I know darts are not the done thing in a kilt - but for some shapes I suspect they are the only solution to get rid of the extra fabric not wanted in the waist but required lower down.

I sugest making the next kilt starting with the back pleats, which looks fine on the latest one, and taking a bit of time to look at how you can fit the aprons - live dangerously and try the kilt on with the aprons pinned in different ways - a couple of tapes sewn to the edges of the pleats inside, so you can tie them at the front to hold the back half of the kilt in place might be an idea.

Some sewing/dressmaking books have sections which tell you what to do to correct wrinkling or folding of a garment depending on where they appear - maybe you can get one from a library - the really good books can be quite expensive to buy, or they are out of print, so a library can be the best option.

[Perldog007]

Great stuff, I can see how those measures would help. Seems I read some kiltmaking instruction page that talked about darting the apron. will revisit that.

I actually like this garment for chunking boxes about the warehouse and puttering about the woodlot. Enjoy and wear all three of my "homespuns", but always striving to improve.

Really enjoy this hobby. Unlike my penchant for enjoying fine single malts and craft brewed stouts, with kiltmaking you end up with something of value at the end of the process.

Thanks as always Pleater.