Tartan mini kilts

[Angela Kaye Bodine]

Bonnie, Hi ! I definitely like the shorter kilts you have done for me.. im glad the SHAW you altered for me, you had to do an inch shorter, since then all my other kilts after the shaw have been an inch shorter.. Thank you...Angie

[argyle24]

Bonnie - what did the length measurement on the mini kilts come out to? The next kilt I plan on making will be a shorter mini kilt for a choreography costume, and I'm trying to get a handle on where it might end up hitting. Did you also end up not doing much of a fell on these? It looks from the pictures here and on Shot of Scotch's FB page that with the low waist, the tapering and fell were taken out of play. I actually initially thought that you had done box pleats, not just wide pleats!

[bonnie heather]

There's no rise on these mini-kilts. But the pleats do have some taper.

I measured the "low waist" for each person at the level of 1" below the belly button. Also I took the seat/hip measurement. For the length, I asked each dancer to hold her arms against her side with hands hanging down. Then I measured from the "low waist" at the top ... down the side of her leg to where the bottom of her middle fingertip hits touches her leg. The longest kilt was 14" and the shortest was 12".

I used 2 panels of tartan, seamed at the back...which came out to about 3 yards. There wasn't enough fabric to make an A-line shaped apron, so I made it straight up and down, But since the mini kilts are so short, I think it worked out okay. If I had more yardage, I would have done the traditionally A shaped apron and would have made
more pleats that would be less wide.

[argyle24]

Thanks so much Bonnie! I really appreciate the response. I'm using a remnant from an aboyne (client overordered) and I've got one more yard on the way, so I'll be able to eek out around 6-7 yards and get it to about 18" long. I don't think I want mine to sit quite as low as these, but it really helps to know the range of the lengths! I can't pull off a mini quite THAT short and wanted to make sure that those weren't in the 17"-18" range I would be working with.

[Katia]

You'll be doing it with deep pleats, then? I've always wanted to see that done in a mini-kilt.

[argyle24]

You'll be doing it with deep pleats, then? I've always wanted to see that done in a mini-kilt.

That's the plan! It'll probably something that I wear for a choreo in the next season or two and/or wear to an event. Mostly I just need to start my second kilt as quickly as possible to make sure I retain everything I learned at Kamp and a mini-kilt is MUCH more economical!

[Katia]

Will be interesting to see how it moves!