Can someone ID this tartan?

**celt72** · 19th April 10, 04:05 PM

So I won this old kilt off of ebay about a week ago. It arrived in the mail today and looks just as great as I hoped it would. I really like it, but I have no idea what tartan it is. Can anyone help me out? It is obviously an old kilt, but it doesn't have the maker's name inside.

**xman** · 19th April 10, 04:08 PM

This might be MacDonald Weathered.

On second thought, the red is too red for weathered and the black isn't black enough really.

Next guess?

**Hothir Ethelnor** · 19th April 10, 05:22 PM

It looks like a Macdonald sett but not in any standard of colours I've seen.

The red stripes also appear to be in the greenish (brown?) colour rather than the blue though...

**davidlpope** · 19th April 10, 05:35 PM

It's appears to be an error of the MacDonald Clan tartan, woven in a very large sett in the reproduction or weathered colors. Green goes to brown (remember, the exact shade of brown, blue, red, etc. isn't what's dispositive), the blue goes to a dove gray, and the black, in this case, goes to a burnt umber color. This is similar to the color palette that D.C. Dalgleish uses for their reproduction colors (black becomes dark brown instead of charcoal as in the Lochcarron weathered).

The error is that the thin red guard lines beside the large black stripes should be in the blue field, vice the green field.

Really nice looking vintage kilt. I looked at this one myself, but it was to small. Good buy- very distinctive and should stand out in a crowd. Cheers!

David

**xman** · 19th April 10, 05:37 PM

Originally Posted by Hothir Ethelnor

The red stripes also appear to be in the greenish (brown?) colour rather than the blue though...

I noticed that too.

I also notice the pleating is to the alternating stripe. Interesting.

**davidlpope** · 19th April 10, 05:39 PM

Originally Posted by xman

I noticed that too.

I also notice the pleating is to the alternating stripe. Interesting.

Right. With a sett this large you really wouldn't be able to pleat to the same stripe unless you wanted a limited number of very deep pleats. You usually have to do the same (pleat to the half sett) with very large setts- Black Watch, Hunting Stewart, etc.

**xman** · 19th April 10, 06:32 PM

Originally Posted by davidlpope

Right. With a sett this large you really wouldn't be able to pleat to the same stripe unless you wanted a limited number of very deep pleats. You usually have to do the same (pleat to the half sett) with very large setts- Black Watch, Hunting Stewart, etc.

Thinking of pleating MacDonald of the Isles Hunting to the stripe then would almost certainly be best to pleat to both the red and white stripe alternating such as this.

Is it impossible to pleat such large setts to the sett then?

**celt72** · 19th April 10, 07:12 PM

Thanks for the help gentleman. I think the size and the colors were throwing me off. I knew somebody would recognize it.

**RockyR** · 19th April 10, 07:24 PM

I ditto the "MacDonald Weathered" sentiment. It's just a very large version of the sett. VERY long straps on that one.

**xman** · 11th May 10, 11:08 PM

I've just received a sample of D C Dalgleish's MacDonald Reproduction tartan and I'm surprised to find that Dalgleish does the same thing this sett does and that is but the outstanding red lines between the black/brown and the green/brown rather than the blue/grey. The 11 oz sample I have is also a 7 1/2" sett which would make a 16 oz custom order a large 11" sett. I would have called this one Dalgleish without a doubt, but the two smaller centred red lines are even smaller in this kilt than they are in my sample swatch so I'm not so sure.