FanX tartan

[OC Richard]

I just spent the weekend in Salt Lake City Utah attending "FanX".

(It used to be called "Salt Lake City Comic Con" but they were sued by the San Diego Comic Con.)

I'm sorry to report that I saw a display showing a tartan that in my opinion is horridly garish, the new and official FanX tartan.

And this display isn't the only place I saw it! There were quite a few people walking around in kilts made from it already, both "casual kilts" and "utility kilts". (Happily no bonnets were sighted.)

[figheadair]

Richard,

Yes, it really is quite nasty looking, especially when compared to the norms of traditional designs. It was designs, or should that be invented, last year and is one the Register - FanX Salt Lake Comic Convention.

It is one of the issues that I have with the Scottish Register of Tartans which has somewhat lost its way with nonsense like this I feel. That said, it's not the Register's fault but that of the committee that set this up and the Scottish Parliament for enacting it. Unfortunately, the wording of the legislation is such that anything that meets the criteria of a tartan (they use my definition) and which is capable of being woven, must be recorded if it is deemed 'new and unique' and the applicant pay the registration fee. That is some way from the original intent which was to protect Scotland's traditional tartans and by extension the weaving and kilt making business. Unfortunately, the genie is well and truly out of the box.

[Jock Scot]

Richard,

............. That is some way from the original intent which was to protect Scotland's traditional tartans and by extension the weaving and kilt making business. Unfortunately, the gene is well and truly out of the box.

What a shame.

[OC Richard]

Yes sorry to hear that Peter.

Not only is the design garish, the fabric has that flimsy crinkly look and plasticky feel of Pakistani acrylic fabric.

And there's that difference between the warp and the weft which I often see with Pakistani tartan. It makes, for example, UK-woven and Pakistani-woven Isle of Skye easy to tell apart from distance.

[stickman]

That mess (I won’t call it tartan) is horrible. Shame on whoever registered that.

[OC Richard]

What's strange is that they didn't really follow the colours of the FanX logo, which are nicer than the colours seen in the tartan.

The colours, in person, are what I would call Navy Blue, Old Gold, and white.

Navy Blue has a purple cast, it's more or less a dark blue-violet (which becomes apparent when you mix Navy Blue paint) and in some versions the FanX logo does tend to look a bit purplish. But using lavender is just wrong.

Old Gold as seen, for example, in some sports team colours can have an orange cast. The tartan does seem to use the correct Old Gold, more or less, but I would be careful not to go too orange.

[kilted2000]

On my screen, the actual logo looks not unlike the Irn Bru colors. The tartan is very ugly to be sure, but I suppose that's the price paid for the ability to design tartans today, such as a tartan for a website or Facebook group. Isn't the whole point of the Registry to record tartans without offering artistic judgment? That said, I wouldn't wear that tartan if someone gave it to me.

[Farmer Jones]

It is cartoonish

[12stones]

While I'm not a fan of the tartan, I wouldn't classify it as ugly and I've seen much less appealing tartans in the Register. What IS ugly is the judgment and elitism displayed in this thread. Some people obviously like this tartan and why shouldn't they be allowed to register it even if it's not to your liking? Also, I would rather people wear so-called ugly tartans and still be part of the kilting community than to not wear kilts at all.

[Patty Logan]

Well at least it has a good backstory. I’ve head of a tartan(hopefully you know the name better then me) that not only has a colour meaning but a thread count associated with the death of the creators dog(the tartan was ugly as well)