Quote Originally Posted by figheadair View Post
The SRT has some old and some new Tartans in its database but by no means all of either category. There is no requirement to register a tartan and doing so offers no legal protection. Some modern designs are protected in law by being registered with the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) but that protection is limit, to a maximum of 20 years I think. The only old tartan that is restricted is the Balmoral and that is at the request of the Monarch and the coalesce of the weavers.

Harris Tweed is defined in law and protected by an Act of Parliament but the majority of the individual designs are not regisitered or protected and in theory most designs could be woven by any weaver. There are a couple of mills that have traditionally woven the Estate tweeds, some of which are technically tartan, but it is more a case of the estate commissioning a run and so controlling it as opposed a fashion type tweed where there is less control. That said, there is a sort of gentleman's agreement and designs are often kept in house. Harris tweed is slightly different because the tweed company provides the design to the individual weaver and they then weave it as a form of piece work.

Technically, a tweed weaver could protect a design by registering it with the IPO. I have no idea if any actually are.
Thank you SO much for expanding my VERY limited knowledge on the subject. I didn't even KNOW that there was a UK "IPO" available to regulate such things. I DO remember, when my sister, son, and I toured Lochcarron in summer 2023 being told that us their mill wove "fashion" tartans for commercial designers on a contractual basis that forbid them to provide any of the fabric to anyone OTHER than the fashion house that had designed the tartan until 3 years AFTER the fashion house stopped ordering it, at which point their contract would permit them to sell whatever they had left in inventory.

My only other experience regarding "restricted" tartans also comes from that tour, where we discovered a tartan designed by (or perhaps for) NHS nurses in Edinburgh as a charitable venture. "The Nursing Tartan," we were told, was restricted to sale by a single retailer (Gordon Nicolson), and ONLY for use in a limited range of products approved by the designers (chiefly scarves, sashes, and such). Every product sale also generated a charitable contribution to the NHS, which I certainly applauded.

Not even kilts could be made from it. It's quite lovely, in my opinion, and when I purchased a scarf for my registered nurse spouse she agreed. Indeed, while I've persuaded her to wear the Robertson Ancient Hunting kilt I had made for her on only ONE single occasion, she's asked multiple times whether I could obtain an ACTUAL, properly pleated kilt for her in The Nursing Tartan, Locharron has just referred me to the Registry, where the designer is named and an email address provided, but only one of several queries (still back in 2023) regarding that has been responded to by the designer, with a polite "no, at least not yet." And while Gordon Nicolson HAS responded to such questions, it's always been that they're limited by what the designer will permit.

Curiously, however, just a few months ago while idling looking at tartan garment retailers' websites, I discovered a pair of "ex hire" Nursing Tartan TREWS on the GNK website, giving ME hope that I MIGHT soon be able to nurture some affection for tartan in my wife's wardrobe.