Hello Taskr,

I confronted a similar situation with a piece of Maple Leaf material that I am making into a kilt for a friend. The tartan was woven by nbfabrics (successor to Batleys), and the sett is about 7 1/2" wide. After pinning up a number of possible knife pleat solutions, I realised that I simply did not have enough fabric to make a knife-pleated kilt, so I embraced the challenge of a box pleat, guided by Barb Tewksbury's and Matt Newsome's instructions.

The Maple Leaf has a red and green undercheck, with a narrow green stripe centred in the red undercheck, and the narrower stripes of brown, green and yellow centred in the green that give this tartan its asymmetry. This is the solution I settled on: I have sewn up seven 3" wide box pleats that alternate the undercheck, R-G-R-G-R-G-R. The result is that each pair of pleats shows 6 of the 7 1/2 inches of the full set.

This solution doesn't quite give the effect of pleating to the sett, because there is a narrow stripe in the other colour at the margin of each undercheck that is visible horizontally but missing from the vertical of the pleats. But nor does it have the strong horizontal effect you get from pleating to the stripe. I am rather pleased with the visual outcome.

But wait, there's more! Normally when you box pleat to the stripe, you go over one sett at a time. With my solution, I have gone over 1 1/2 setts each pleat, but even so, there is plenty enough material for me to include a slash pocket on the right-hand side. (Those familiar with Steve Ashton's slash pockets know that one of these requires fully 20 inches of material: it starts like a 10" deep pleat.)

So, Taskr, unless you have already started pleating, and unless your sett is less than 6", might I respectfully suggest that you try test pinning your box pleats to the alternate undercheck.

But wherever you are at, may you Kilt On And Prosper!