Twill Question...

[M. A. C. Newsome]

Cloth *does* have a "good" side and a "bad" side. Sometimes when you get the cloth in from the mill there are slight pulls and knots on one side of the cloth. You want to make sure that that side goes on the inside of the kilt. The "good" side (or face) of the fabric will have the twill running from lower left to upper right, when the kilt is being worn.

But with modern fabric production techniques, I only rarely encounter visible flaws in the non-face side of the fabric. Sometimes it's so flawless that there really is no difference.

If I had a kilt made with the twill going the wrong way, so long as there were no visible flaws in the cloth, I don't think I'd give it a second thought. I'd probably be the only one to know the difference!
Matt

[Barb T]

Used to be that tartan came with the "face" or good side marked for the reasons that Matt mentioned. I've even gotten single-width tartan that has the kilting selvedge marked (although that's typically easier to distinguish!). As Matt said, now both faces are pretty much equally good. There's only one mill that I get tartan from that still marks the good side and consistently folds the good side in (as most nice single-sided cloth used to be sold in fabric stores), but even they only do it for custom weaves.

I agree with Matt. The traditional way of making a kilt is twill line right to left top to bottom, but it's something that no one's ever going to notice. And there's no structural reason for it. In terms of things to be unhappy about in a kilt, it's _way_ down at the bottom of the list!!

Barb