How fast can I make a "kilt"?

[way2fractious]

How do you line a kilt? Do you just line the aprons? Do you pleat the lining?

In kilts made traditionally, a liner is necessary to cover up the work done in the area between the hips and waist across the back. Although beautiful to a kiltmaker, to other eyes the cut pleats and stitched-in hair canvas would look awful - and it's scratchy, too! The liner has about a half-dozen pleats to accommodate the tapering of the tartan pleats on the outside.

The liners across the aprons, from hip to waist also, cover and reinforce the strips of hair canvas that keep the tartan from stretching across our tummies.

A traditional kilt is not lined below the hip line. In fact, the liner is hand stitched across the inside back at hip level, then folded up, pleated for the tapering, and hand stitched all around to finish.

When the chance next arises, buy, borrow, or check out of a library the book, The Art of Kiltmaking, which details the procedure.

Some contemporary kilts may be completely lined - for example, a denim kilt lined with flannel. But that's for those (of us ) who like to experiment with new things, too.

[Pleater]

A traditional kilt is not lined below the hip line. In fact, the liner is hand stitched across the inside back at hip level, then folded up, pleated for the tapering, and hand stitched all around to finish.

In sewing terms, the shaping is perhaps more clearly described as having unsewn darts at the waist, as the lower edge is not folded but lies flat along the edge of the fell.

[way2fractious]

In sewing terms, the shaping is perhaps more clearly described as having unsewn darts at the waist, as the lower edge is not folded but lies flat along the edge of the fell.

Thank you, Pleater. You are right about using the term "dart", which is the term Barbara uses in the book. Alas, I am not terribly skilled at sewing generally. Any poor skills I may possess relate only to making kilts, nothing else.

[Pleater]

Thank you, Pleater. You are right about using the term "dart", which is the term Barbara uses in the book. Alas, I am not terribly skilled at sewing generally. Any poor skills I may possess relate only to making kilts, nothing else.

No need to sound contrite - I just thought I'd pipe up for the sake of clarity.

Mind you if you'd had our Miss Ragg teaching you sewing at an impressionable age you'd know all the terms and be able to recite them alphabetically (probably whilst standing to attention). She was the games mistress as well.

She probably mugs teenage gangs on the way to fetch her pension these days.