The Title of "Master Kiltmaker"

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

A HA! I found a few tidbits hidden in the "About" section, which you can find at the bottom of the homepage.

(The bolded emphasis is mine)


I'm pretty sure he is saying that he is a MILITARY master kilt maker. Is this a real title in the military, or is he making that up?

According to his website he spent seven years in the cadets, and seven years in the Royal Marines as a bandsman/bugler. No mention of training as a military tailor in the RM...

Looking at his pictures I'd guess his rank is W/1. I didn't notice any medals when he was on parade in his green balmoral, green jumper, and saffron kilt, so presumably his time of service didn't include a tour in NI, Bosnia, Afghanistan, or anywhere in the Middle East. Then again he may have just decided not to wear gongs.

But military service isn't important. What counts is the quality of his kilts, not the price. If his kilts are better than, say, Stewart Christie in Edinburgh, then perhaps the price is justified. But if they aren't the best kilts in the world (and for that money they'd better be) then in six months time he'll be doing something else.

[Paul Henry]

I'd love to find out more about the London Kilt Making Guild, I live in London, and I make Kilts, if it exists, I'd be very interested.

[Bugbear]

Oh ok, I understand now. I had whiddled down my post to just that question, but I had tried to ask if it was the students of the Master who were also making the what ever it is in the masters name. I had a difficult time with the wording and cut all that out in an edit.

It answers my question about the guild and whether the master would be the actual person making the item or a student under the master's supervision. Sounds like the practices of some artists and other crafts of today; you don't know for certain that the actual artist who signs the piece was the person who created it or just the person who finnished it up.

I probably missed the point.

[Rex_Tremende]

Wow. I can't get past those laces on the ghillies to see the kilts.

Rex.

[Bugbear]

Wow. I can't get past those laces on the ghillies to see the kilts.

Rex.

Guess sometimes I'm lucky I can't be distracted by these pictures... Like that blue vest picture I had the other day.

Not that the words don't create their own pictures sometimes, or that I wouldn't mind being distracted by the kilt pictures.

[DWFII]

I've been following this conversation and thought this tidbit might fit in...or not.

In some Trades, all the way back to the middle ages, the term "master" merely meant that the man owned his own shop. Not all guilds required a "Master Piece," although it is a comforting fiction that we all pretty much subscribe to.

[Bugbear]

Well, I keep thinking of the Master Gardener certification, which is, if I remember correctly, through the county extention out here.

Anyway, every time this comes up, it does make me nervous because there are no specific examples given between the differences in the "old traditional" kilts and the "tailored" kilts. Is Barb's book showing the tailored kilt construction, that's what we seem to know here, or is the book about the old traditional ways as learned at the Keith Kilt School? Exactly who is it making these tailored kilts that are so hated by the traditional kilt makers who have been trained in the old ways?

It just puts a bit of doubt in my mind on what I have learned about kilts so far because I can't figure out what is being talked about with these differences.

[Rex_Tremende]

I'm guessing the techniques Master Kiltmakers use are the old traditional ones. I know I've heard/read some distain for "tailored" kilts from kiltmakers trained in the old traditional ways.

Exactly who is it making these tailored kilts that are so hated by the traditional kilt makers who have been trained in the old ways?

It just puts a bit of doubt in my mind on what I have learned about kilts so far because I can't figure out what is being talked about with these differences.

Really! What are you talking about? Could we have some citations please?

Thanks,
Rex.

[Bugbear]

* This post self-destructed. *

[Pleater]

In my native Yorkshire back in the 17 and 18 hundreds there were numerous small workshops - not for kilts, though, casting and blacksmithing was more the thing, or carpentry and cabinet making - the owner and chief craftsman was called little mester - said 'meh-stah'.

I assume the title goes back before the vowel slide that altered mester to master.

There were mesters that had bigger works and small factories, and gret mesters who made huge factories and built whole towns to serve them.

I suspect that many of them were outside the Guild organisation as there simply wasn't time for the slow ascent through the ranks when there was experimentation and innovation everywhere, and a young man with ideas could find himself employed to assist or just to work out his own ideas for someone with money to invest in new technology.

If something new was developed then he could find himself unable to leave that employment in order to attain Guild qualifications as it would mean revealing the process to other Guild members.

These days I would take any craft type title with a pinch of salt if it was not fully explained just who it was awarding the title, as so many formerly powerful Guilds are now little more than voluntary associations of professional people, whilst others are little more than wishful thinking.

Anne the Pleater