The other thing I have noticed with the "new" site is in terms of the choice of cloth.

For many items (other than kilts) there is no longer any choice - it's this cloth in this tartan or nothing. Of course that makes sense for them - but limits the choice of their customers.

For kilts and some other items there is still a choice - but they no longer provide info on the mills.

For example, an 8 yard Balmoral kilt in Ancient MacFarlane Hunting offers 7 choices - two of which are in 16oz fabric, these are described as:


  • Strome Select range. A heavy worsted wool, hardwearing with a slightly rough and ridged finish, hardy and long-lasting, ideal for a traditional 8 yard hand made heirloom kilt, though with a tuck-in selvedge; woven by a top Scottish mill, this specialist range of rarer tartans has a very large sett; their ancient shades in this fabric range are typically pale and subdued, which some may prefer; and



  • Artisan Tartan, Heavy (Narrow) Simply the finest traditional kilting tartan available, by Scotland's premier tartan weaving mill, deep in the Scottish Borders. Your pure new wool fabric will be woven to order on narrow width looms using time-proven hand-crafted methods. This robust fabric has a high thread density and is ideal for kiltmaking, or also for upholstery - in fact anywhere you'd want a really durable finish. The traditional shuttle loom finish means that a hem may be required for kiltmaking.

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From the descriptions and further info it might be possible to work out which mill a certain cloth comes from.

Strome is a name used Lochcarron for their heavyweight tartan - but to the uninitiated this isn't obvious. The description is also not quite as glowing as that given for the Artisan tartan. Which, with a little guess work is from DC Dalgliesh - their own mill (the Artisan label is one they use to generally describe their tartans - but the real give away is the images for these have the Clan watermark).

With the other weights there is perhaps less to go on, Brariach and Reiver are mentioned (both Lochcarron designations) but for others there are only references to a "highly respected Scottish weaver" etc. Most likely HoE as Marton Mills are south of the border.

Seams a little odd to no longer provide this level of transparency.