Tweed kilts? What do you think?

[MNlad]

Rocky at USA Kilts makes a great 5-yard tweed kilt at a reasonable price. Mine is going on 5 years and the pleats are holding up quite well—13 oz. Lachcarron wool and readily available as yard goods. Anne is right, some tweeds can be harsh, but others can be quite comfortable. It's all over the board depending on weight and manufacture.

[jhockin]

I searched websites, and agonized for years, but finally bought direct from a weaver, who seemed to have the best prices I could find:
http://harristweedandknitwear.co.uk/index.html
... But, haven't made it into a kilt yet ( "sidelined" with an injury, so can't sew), so I can't comment on how well it will hold a pressing; however, search " tweed kilt" , on this website, will provide numerous previous comments, from those who have tweed kilts, and I seem to recollect, comments on how well they hold a pressing, on the pleats.

[seanachie]

John at Keltoi does tweed kilts and at a significantly better price. I can attest to his skills as a kilt maker, mine is not tweed however but I wouldn't hesitate to commission him to make one for me had I the cash.
http://www.gaelicclothing.com/thetweedie.htm

I will vouch for this. I have two Tweed kilts from Keltoi, John does a splendid job. Both tweeds are from Marton Mills. I am especially fond of the Pheasant Agate Lovat Flame.

[English Bloke]

I like tweed kilts, I want one but funds do not allow at the moment. It's on my wish-list though.

[Jock Scot]

I am a huge fan of tweed and spend much of my life clad in it. I do quite like some, not all(the colour shades [brash] are not right), tartans woven in tweed and I saw more examples of that,than I knew existed on a recent trip to Harris and of course they would make a fine kilt. However, I am really not convinced that non tartan tweed in general does make a fine looking kilt. Perhaps, its my tartan kilt or nothing way of thinking at work here, but in my view of things the look of non tartan tweed kilts do not work.

You may be interested to know that non tartan tweed kilts are genuinely a very rare sight in Scotland, yes I know they are made and sold(House of Bruar may still sell them?) here and as far as I can recall, I have only ever seen one non tartan tweed kilt in the wild. A deer stalker, gone now I think, who would wear his heavy(28 ounce I expect) estate tweed, which was made into a three piece kilt suit, in all weathers and at all times. Midges, ticks, rain, blizzards, rocks, bogs, thorns-- the lot, were of no consequence to that hardy kilted man!

[gwynng]

Midges, ticks, rain, blizzards, rocks, bogs, thorns-- the lot, were of no consequence to that hardy kilted man!

I don't know about the midges part, Jock. Ticks: check, know how to pull those properly. Rain, blizzards: weather is manageable, even braved a few tornadoes in the Midwest. Rocks, bogs, thorns: grew up in the Rocky Mountains, not much in the way of bogs, but everything else.

MIDGES, though! Whew, what a blight! My first encounter was around Glencoe. Watching a beautiful sunset looking out over the river flowing into the loch. Perfection and then suddenly they attacked. It felt as if the midges were trying to suck my brain out through my ears. Wow, those are nasty buggers! Scots are indeed hearty folk to endure summers with those cursed creatures.

Oh yes, forgot this thread was about tweed.:crap: Does tweed ward of midges? (bringing it full circle)

[Jock Scot]

Only if it is thick enough!

[dmackorth]

I've been hankering after a tweed kilt for some time... I saw one here
http://www.sourceculture.co.uk/produ...ntlemen-kilts/
but the price made me take a long sit down... once I got my breath back, I found a cheaper, but better known example in 21st Century Kilts,
http://21stcenturykilts.com/product/5/harris-tweed-kilt
and a more sensible price. I would pay £650 for one of Howie's creations compared to this unknown manufacturer's eyewatering £945 to £1065 The rest of the items on SourceCulture's page seem to me to be posh junk (bric-a-brac, as we say here in the UK )

I've toyed with the idea of tweed but I need to save up first...

Hi Gents,
My name is Duncan MacDonald-Korth and I am the owner of SourceCulture, the webshop mentioned in the quoted thread above. We have been getting a lot of click throughs from Xmarks so I wanted to come and read the post. As I saw, some took exception to our pricing for kilts, so I wanted to address that here.

Firstly, I want to apologise that the prices were so high. Upon reading this forum I talked to our craftsmen responsible for the kilts, and we had in fact had a miscommunication regarding their pricing. If you return to our site (http://www.sourceculture.co.uk/produ...ntlemen-kilts/) you will see that we have dropped the prices £200-300 on both the men's and women's kilts, with Gents kilts now at £785 instead of £1065. These kilts are made by an expert kilt maker in the Outer Hebrides who has been making kilts for twenty years and sources all of her tweed locally.

Secondly, I just want to respond to the comment that we sell "posh junk". I will give you a personal assurance that the opposite is in fact true. My wife and I, in fact, started SourceCulture only to sell the highest quality goods, as we were frustrated with the overpriced junk sold all over the high street and the so-called "luxury" industry. We personally know every craftsmen on our site, and have quality tested all the items. Every product we sell is made locally (in the origin country of the craftsmen), and every single piece is made to the highest quality standards established by the traditions of its respective industry. The result of this is that every piece we sell is both extremely durable and beautiful. Also, our highest cost items (like the pen mentioned), is very expensive because of the high materials cost (gold, diamonds etc.). The margin achieved on such an item is not any higher than on regular items, in other words, you are not paying for nothing.

As a last thought on this matter I just wanted to let everyone know that the reason we ended up starting the SourceCulture in the first place is that my wife and I had purchased goods from some of the craftsmen on our site, and they had treated us so well over the years, that we thought there must be a market to sell more of these great products than the craftsmen were then achieving.

I personally stand by every product we sell. Please feel free to contact me through this site or SourceCulture if you have any questions.

Best wishes to everybody and we hope you will give us a second look.

Duncan MacDonald-Korth

[Calgacus]

I'm not a huge fan of non-tartan tweed kilts, but here's another source of tartan and non-tartan tweed kilts.

http://katesoriginals.co.uk/index.html

[jhockin]

I would like to suggest that at least one photo of the pleats, might help( at least for xmarkers, such as the OP) sales.
Also: for those of us, on this forum, the "weight" of a kilt refers to the weight ( ie: grams per meter/ oz. per yd. [ex.: 13 oz/yd, or 24 oz/yd] )of the cloth, rather than the amount of yardage making up the kilt ( which can vary depending upon pleating option/style [ex.: box pleats, knife pleats, etc.], and girth of the person buying the kilt). FYI ;0)