Tell newbie about kilt pins

[plaid preacher]

Well you have gotten most of the wisdom on kilt pins. I went a long time without one, until I found one I really liked. Like McMurdo, I appreciate vintage pins and so all my kilt pins are vintage. One piece of advice that was offered a long time ago, and OCRichard touches on it, is that you can have too many representations of your clan crest, i.e. - hat badge, lapel pin, tie clasp, belt buckle, sporran flap AND kilt pin. One will probably suffice, and don't forget you are also wearing a clan tartan. So find a pin that you love.

Here is a photo of a couple of my pins. Forgive the quality, I took the photo as part of my inventory when I was moving homes, and so it is more for insurance purposes than to show off my bling. (My favourite is on my kilt, so not in the photo).

[figheadair]

A Gordon Highlander wearing a plain silver safety pin; it appears to have a ball at bottom, a style often seen. (There's another style with a silver rod with silver balls screwed onto each end.)

The so-called Atholl Highlanders' pin. I don't wear one but if I did, this would be my kilt pin of choice.

[Troglodyte]

To be clear, some experienced kilt wearers don't wear a kilt pin at all and if that is their choice then not an eyebrow is raised. There does seem to be an opinion here on this website from some that there is a risk of the pin catching on something and tearing the kilt cloth. I am not saying it does not happen, but after a rather long time wearing the kilt in all sorts of terrain with a "safety pin" style of pin, I have never managed to rip the kilt in that fashion and I have never personally known anyone else do it either. On the other hand, Land Rover door catches are entirely another matter!

Ah, yes, the Landrover door..!

But that's nothing compared to baler-twine that always seems hell-bent on a do-or-die, no-holds-barred attack launched with the sole intention of recreating the Gordian knot..!

[Troglodyte]

These are variations on a theme -

DSCF3051a.jpg


They measure 3 inches, 3 1/2 inches and four inches - the top one is the simple 'military' style.

[Jock Scot]

These are variatins on a theme -

DSCF3051a.jpg


They measure 3 inches, 3 1/2 inches and four inches - the top one is the simple 'military' style.

Yes the top one is exactly like mine. Made by Hamilton and Inches of Edinburgh , hall marked silver with a 1913 date letter and belonged to my Grandfather.

[Jock Scot]

Ah, yes, the Landrover door..!

But that's nothing compared to baler-twine that always seems hell-bent on a do-or-die, no-holds-barred attack launched with the sole intention of recreating the Gordian knot..!

We call it a general, random, rural initiative test to see if the knot/knots can be undone in a day without using a knife and without having a breakdown of some sort!.

[DCampbell16B]

I have three kilt pins. The first was a tatty thing as I thought I had to have something when I was a teenager. The third showed up unasked as one of those clan badge on a claymore styles. I doubt I’ll ever wear it.

The second means something. I was staying with an older Gaelic speaking couple in Lewis for a while on my only trip to Scotland (and the little Gaelic I have has a decidedly Lewis sound to it). Walking on Traigh Shandaidh I picked up a fist sized piece of milky quartz. Later I was walking down the street in Inverness and saw some white metal kilt pins in the window. One was a claymore style with a ring of the shop’s initials in a circle rather than a targe. When I got home I took the quartz to my grandfather. He was a very talented man who built his own telescope (including grinding the mirrors), his own ham radios, his own TV. He traveled up and down the East Coast taking pictures of birds and giving talks about them. He also taught himself to cut, polish and even facet stones. He cut the quartz into a circle for me, polished it and found a way to fasten it to the pin over the store initials.

After almost 40 years I wear it every time I wear my kilt. I have a piece of Lewis and my grandfather with me.

[OC Richard]

Yes as Jock says the car door can grab a kilt pin! And many other things, especially for pipers and drummers.

As I've mentioned before, I think any Pipe Band who issues out kilt pins is asking for trouble.

Over my 45 years in Pipe Band I have, on several occasions, looked through entire "band sets" of kilts, sets of 40 or so kilts which have been worn for a quarter-century or more by successive generations of band members.

The kilts of bands who wore kilt pins and the kilts of of bands who didn't are like night and day.

Non-kilt pin wearing bands might have the usual split open pleats and stains and the random pull here or there, but the aprons will be in fairly good shape.

Kilt pin wearing bands will have visible wear on nearly all the aprons in the affected area. A good percentage will have holes. Several will have rent fabric, sometimes big enough to put your hand through.

Why bands in particular? Snare drums are heavy and bulky and have an astonishing number of things poking out which can catch on the kilt pin on the drum's way down every time the drummer un-hooks the drum.

At gigs pipers often have to march through crowded rooms full of people sitting on chairs around tables. The pipers' hands are busy on the chanter so chairs must be shoved out of the way with the knees- and the tops of the chair-backs are often the exact height of the kilt pins, giving predictable results.

[Jock Scot]

Yes as Jock says the car door can grab a kilt pin! And many other things, especially for pipers and drummers.
............

Just to be clear, I did not say that car doors “grab kilt pins”. I thought I had made it clear that I had never had a kilt pin catching on something(anything)and producing a rip in my kilts and I have never heard of anyone else doing so either. On the other hand, I thought I had made it perfectly clear that Land Rover door latches were the cause of rips and tears and to be clear, not only with kilts.

Two of my kilts for certain sure succumbed to this hazard and in each case the kilt pin had absolutely nothing to do with the incident.Likewise others , not just with their kilts, have been “ambushed” by the dreaded door latch hazard.

I wonder why bandsmen have such trouble with their kilts and kilt pins? I imagine, perhaps wrongly, that the general environment that they wear the kilt is not anything like as “hazardous” to kilts as the countryside.

[Troglodyte]

We call it a general, random, rural initiative test to see if the knot/knots can be undone in a day without using a knife and without having a breakdown of some sort!.

And with a running commentary in words of one syllable and four letters only..!