The lonely but mighty box-pleat

[seanachie]

Whenever I wear one of my four yard box pleated kilts out to a Highland Games (or any other Scottish function, for that matter), I have to say that I rarely get a comment. I find that most people, even those men in kilts themselves, either don't notice the difference, or don't care to comment if they do.

The ones who do comment generally fall into one of two categories.
1) They are observant and notice that my pleats "don't look like everyone else's" and want to ask me about the difference.
2) They have done some research into the history of the kilt and recognize the style, and just want to compliment my kilt.

Either way I'm happy to have a conversation about it. (What, Matt likes to talk about kilts? You're kidding!) :-)

I strongly agree with these comments. I have a solid green knife pleat from Stillwater, but the remaining wool kilts I own are all box pleated. I have worn them to a number of events and never once has anyone had any difficult identifying it as a kilt not has anyone commented about it being box rather than knife pleated. It seems the only place this becomes a point of discussion is in this and other kilt forums. What I find even odder is that box pleats are very much a part of the history of the kilt, and have strong historical footing yet raise so many negative comments. For these reasons I would think they would be embraced rather than derided. No matter, I love my box pleats.