Stitching the edge of pleats on a utility kilt?

[eahuntley]

This morning I washed the Kilt that I've been making(all finished, aside from belt loops and straps). It's made from Cotton Duck material, and doesn't have the edge stitching. It's now become abundantly clear why the edge stitching is common; This thing is a mess! I think I'll definitely try edge stitching on my next Kilt.

I normally wouldn't have washed something before I was completely done with it, but I had heard rumors that the new chalk I was using might not come out of the material. The chalk washed right out, and now I get some practice ironing pleats as well!

[tundramanq]

If you can source some cotton/rayon (aka Viscose) twill fabric with a high percentage of rayon it will hold crease in washing if you cool wash and hang dry with clothes pins holding the pleat ends in place - like Poly/Viscose. Both want some edge sharpening with an iron after a few washes. Sport Kilt used to use cotton/rayon fabric, but now they claim to be using poly/rayon fabric.
Pure cotton like pure polyester is supple and unable to hold a crease.
Rayon is derived from wood cellulose and gives the crease holding power.
I have never seen duck that wasn't 100% cotton.

[Lady Grey]

Everything Barb said
It may be possible to iron then stitch the pleats as is.
It won't look great but it will be usable.
Did you follow the X kilt instructions?

[eahuntley]

This particular kilt was started using an entirely different set of instructions, which lacks a lot of the features the X-kilt has. I've since scrapped that kilt and started over with a better material, along with the aid of the X-kilt manual. I also didn't read the entire manual until last night, so I have now found the section on edge stitching. I had previously not noticed edge stitching on many kilts, but I think I just wasn't looking for it.