What do you think of this? A tartan based upon a military decoration!

**KD Burke** · 12th December 10, 08:03 AM

I'm not sure why this idea came to mind. It came, out of the blue, the other day, and I was compelled to try to

The Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal has, to my eye, a particularly unattractive ribbon. There is no reason whatsoever to suspect it would form the basisof an attractive tartan. It looks like this:

Nevertheless, I thought I would see what it looked like. I replicated the ribbon's pattern on a dark blue field because all of the US forces use blue as the basis of the dress uniform.

Here is the result:

What do you think? Is this an attractive sett? If so, why? (Why not?)

I'd be grateful to any moderator for correcting my typo in the subject line!

**Graham A. Robieson** · 12th December 10, 08:25 AM

Greetings,

I think this might be difficult as the colours look a mix between air force and army etc, I designed a tartan based on RAF colours to commemorate John & Isabella Buchanan (it's on the register) e.g. Red, White, Blue and Sky Blue but also I used pro. colours on scotweb tartan designer to show this image.

The ribbon can make 2 separate tartans based on the air force and army etc, to make one as a joint tartan will be challenging.

Another note: the ribbon has 8 colours to it and often 6 is max for weaving.

All the best,

Graham

**Graham A. Robieson** · 12th December 10, 09:13 AM

Greetings,

This is my attempt at an AFES tartan (with 6 colours/primary colours):

Armed Forces Expeditionary Service (USA) Symmetrical - #001

Armed Forces Expeditionary Service (USA) Symmetrical - #002

All the best,

Graham

**davidlpope** · 12th December 10, 09:48 AM

I've seen this sort of thing done with other campaign ribbons, but am not quite sure where the demand for this tartan would come from. Most veterans I've run across who rate this award seem perfectly content to wear their clan tartan / branch of service tartan and miniature medals, when appropriate, to evidence their military service.

I think that military tartans have their place (I enjoy wearing my Leatherneck tartan kilt) and tartans which are visually attractive (Isle of Skye) attract lots of devotees, but at some point it seems to be needless multiplication of tartans if there isn't enough demand for a new tartan to sustain it.

There are so many wonderful old tartans that IMHO would be better candidates for a custom weave opportunity, it seems like a bit of a shame to design a tartan that will likely be "orphaned" as soon as it is designed.

Cordially,

David

**Tobus** · 12th December 10, 04:06 PM

Visually speaking, I like all the examples shown. But then again, I'm fairly easy to please.

David raises a very good point, though. Practically speaking, this would be an 'orphan' virtually from the get-go. I'm not sure there would be more than a handful of people who put enough emphasis on that one decoration to want it to be the center of their wardrobe.

But again, I do like the looks of the tartans (the symmetrical sett #001 being my favorite). It's an interesting mixture of colors, and they're separated enough to complement each other without getting all mixed up.

Another note: the ribbon has 8 colours to it and often 6 is max for weaving.

Why is that, I wonder? I would think that a custom weave would be capable of having as many colors as the loom could handle. Wouldn't it be possible, for example, for the entire sett to have every thread be a different color? Limiting a tartan to only 6 colors seems to be quite a handicap on the potential for tartans to be complex (which may or may not be a good thing).

I don't know anything about looms, so any explanation would be appreciated!

**Paul Henry** · 12th December 10, 04:18 PM

Originally Posted by Tobus

snip..
I would think that a custom weave would be capable of having as many colors as the loom could handle. Wouldn't it be possible, for example, for the entire sett to have every thread be a different color? Limiting a tartan to only 6 colors seems to be quite a handicap on the potential for tartans to be complex (which may or may not be a good thing).

I don't know anything about looms, so any explanation would be appreciated!

The are a number of possible reasons, a few to start

Any design or image (not just tartans) with multiple colours is much harder to balance - to get "right" How many commercial logos only have a few colours!

To many colours can often lead to a "muddier" colour balance.

As a designer it's nice to have a limiter on the brief as well, having a challenge helps to focus the mind!

I suspect that the setting the warp with multiple colours wouldn't be so difficult, but for the weft you need a bobbin/shuttle for each colour, and this will add extra work/time/money to the weaving.

Just a few thoughts

**figheadair** · 13th December 10, 01:00 AM

Originally Posted by davidlpope

I've seen this sort of thing done with other campaign ribbons, but am not quite sure where the demand for this tartan would come from. Most veterans I've run across who rate this award seem perfectly content to wear their clan tartan / branch of service tartan and miniature medals, when appropriate, to evidence their military service.

I think that military tartans have their place (I enjoy wearing my Leatherneck tartan kilt) and tartans which are visually attractive (Isle of Skye) attract lots of devotees, but at some point it seems to be needless multiplication of tartans if there isn't enough demand for a new tartan to sustain it.

There are so many wonderful old tartans that IMHO would be better candidates for a custom weave opportunity, it seems like a bit of a shame to design a tartan that will likely be "orphaned" as soon as it is designed.

Cordially,

David

Absolutely, I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately needless multiplication is here and running rampant with literally dozens of new tartans this year along, but I gain solace in the thought that the wheel will turn full circle and one day people will see the value of those truly old setts that we can date to the C18th Highlands.

**BoldHighlander** · 13th December 10, 01:09 AM

Originally Posted by figheadair

Absolutely, I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately needless multiplication is here and running rampant with literally dozens of new tartans this year along, but I gain solace in the thought that the wheel will turn full circle and one day people will see the value of those truly old setts that we can date to the C18th Highlands.

I for one do Peter

Having said that, may I ask if you have a sample (photo) of the Macdonell of Keppoch in WOB colours?

**xman** · 13th December 10, 02:04 AM

Originally Posted by BoldHighlander

may I ask if you have a sample (photo) of the Macdonell of Keppoch in WOB colours?

*drooling*

**figheadair** · 13th December 10, 06:19 AM

Originally Posted by BoldHighlander

I for one do Peter

Having said that, may I ask if you have a sample (photo) of the Macdonell of Keppoch in WOB colours?

I assume that you are referring to the standard Keppoch sett. This is an interesting one. Stewart includes it in his Old & Rare but the specimen that he cites is unknown, to me at least. There is a specimen of a very similar sett in the West Highland Museum with two blue lines on the red/green ground as opposed to the one in the Keppoch. I suspect that it is a Wilsons' piece but cannot get to over check it until next month. That said, there is no record of Wilsons weaving the Keppoch but if they did the colours would be the same as those in similar setts such as their: New Bruce (now Drummond/Grant), MacGillivray etc, etc. Here's my weaving of the New Bruce in their shades.