Who says machine sewn kilts don't "swish"?

[kiltedwolfman]

I was sifting through some pics from our solids photo shoot and these two do a great job of showing just how well you can get a "real" swish with a contemporary kilt. The khaki kilt is made with "rugged" pleats and the brown one with "refined" pleats and took 7 1/2 and 9 1/2 yards of ploy/cotton respectively.

These were taken as we walked leisurely away from the camera and while we certainly have swagger there was no forced gait to produce swish, just regular old fashioned "Dang we look good" striding.

[Laird_M]

Yeap, does look good and sure does the 'Highland schwing'.

Learning to use the wife's sewing machine so will be interesting to see if my attempt at a machine sewn will swish and swing as well....

[Mikilt]

Darn right!

[HarveyH]

Do people really say they don't swish??

It's not the stitching which makes the difference however the weight and amount of the cloth and the position of the fell line on the body all have an effect on the amount of swish.

New denim is actually quite firm fabric but also usually quite lightweight. It does not easily stretch and is really hard to hand sew because of the nature of the fibres. In addition to being a lighter fabric contemporary kilts tend to have fewer pleats and accordingly less cloth.

Wool fibers are very different and the sort of worsted wool cloth used in most traditional kilts tends to be quite a lot heavier, in addition they tend to be made with a lot more cloth which adds further to the weight (and will therefore have more momentum in its swing) but also wool is easier to sew by hand simply because of the different natures of the fibres.

I don't believe the use of a machine for the sewing will have any great impact on the swing.

My eight yard wool kilts swish more than my 5 yard denim kilt. They are all knife pleated. But the denim is less then half the weight of the wool kilts and so ordinary physics will determine that there is less swing.

[ratspike]

Quality poly/cotton swishes way better than it's given credit for, especially when there's a bunch of it around back. It twirls and spins nicely too.

[mac]

what brand of kilts are these - look good.

mac

[JohntheBiker]

I was sifting through some pics from our solids photo shoot and these two do a great job of showing just how well you can get a "real" swish with a contemporary kilt. The khaki kilt is made with "rugged" pleats and the brown one with "refined" pleats and took 7 1/2 and 9 1/2 yards of ploy/cotton respectively.

These were taken as we walked leisurely away from the camera and while we certainly have swagger there was no forced gait to produce swish, just regular old fashioned "Dang we look good" striding.

You clearly "field-tested" the garments.

[kiltedwolfman]

LOL, we keep a pretty decent sized compendium of kilt pics in various albums so when we are talking to clients who are new to the kilt we can show that there are many ways to wear the kilt and that we've for the most part sported them all.

[TheOfficialBren]

Would these jackets be appropriate for our much warmer Southern California climes?

I would love a kilt jacket but I rarely have a day cool enough to merit wearing (read purchasing) one. For reference when I wear my suit I usually end up taking the jacket off whilst indoors.

Very smashing jackets. I like that they are a garment for the twenty first century but are firmly rooted in THCD.

[Steve Ashton]

Actually Bren I designed these jackets to be a complete break from what some of our members call THCD.

The only thing similar is that they are cut shorter in the body to end at the hips so you don't hide the pleats and there is a modest cut away in the front for the sporran. Otherwise they are a pretty regular man's suit coat.
No one was offering anything similar to this when I started this project over five years ago. All the jackets that were available showed a strong military influance. So I went in the opposite direction.

I now notice that quite a few larger companies are offering a similar style jacket as a break from the more traditional styles. I think I started a trend away from the cookie cutter quasi military look that is so prevalent in THCD.