Pleats under the apron?

[jkdesq]

Gack, you ironed your kilt while it was wet? Assuming you are talking about a wool kilt, this seems to me to be very dangerous. Heat and moisture is a dangerous combination for wool. The combination can cause wool to shrink -- irreversible!

Cotton is quite the opposite, use a very high temperature and iron straight out of the washing machine, if you want.

I don't like the idea of pleats under your apron. Seems to me it would look like a crinolin. Now, if you could find a poodle kilt pin, you would be all ready for the hop.

[Barb T]

Actually, a hot damp press is what you use for a kilt, and it won't shrink your kilt.

What shrinks the wool is temperature shocks coupled with agitation. So, the best way to shrink wool is to put it into hot water (which opens up the little plates on each wool fiber), mush it around a lot (walk on it, rub it, let the agitator in your washer beat it up), and then plunge it into cold water (which clamps the little plates down and locks in the new configuration). This is why your wool kilt hose get thick on the bottom if you wear them around a lot. And, it's also how wool felt is produced (although that's typically done from carded wool, not from woven fabric).

Cheers,

Barb

[jkdesq]

Didn't know the aggitation aspect of it. Thanks for the correction.

The other fear I have of pressing my kilt (and other wool clothing) is the sheen that you can get from pressing. I always iron my kilt with the outside down (so the iron is touching the inside). Any words of wisedom there, Barb or anyone else?

[cavscout]

You may also find that with a deeper first and last pleat you may in effect have almost 3 complete layers in front.

[The Wizard of BC]

The iron should NEVER EVER touch the fabric!!!
Use a pressing cloth over the fabric. A pillow case will work well.

And NEVER iron by moving the iron over the fabric. That's what you do to a shirt to remove small wrinkles.
Crease the pleats by placing the iron on and pressing down, hard, allowing the heat to penetrate. Then allow the fabric to cool to set the crease.

If you have wrinkled the kilt, remove the wrinkles by hanging the kilt and using a steamer. The controlled heat of steam will allow the wrinkles to fall out and yet not disturb the pleat creases.

[Pleater]

When pressing I use a couple of layers of thick card to suport the pleat - so there is no imprint from the pleat edge beneath. Work on a little at a time - don't try to do the whole pleat in one go unless you have the edge basted - I tried and then spent four times longer getting it onto the correct line.

I roll the pleat onto the correct line then cover with a damp cloth if there is wool in the fabric - otherwise it will become polished. Use only smooth fabric and surfaces for pressing - a towel, for instance, will make the surface uneven.

I have only made a few kilts, but some fabric really does seem to dictate just what it can and can't be sewn into. Perhaps my failures as a beginner will be useful?

When calculating the pleating to the set - which I tried and gave up on with a plaid rather than a true tartan, I found that the thickness of the cloth and the place in the pattern have to be allowed for. I found that I needed to make the visible part of the pleat slightly wider than I calculated because the bends actually take a measurable amount of fabric - obvious when you think about it.

The maths was easy enough - just find the number of sets equivalent to the back width, the number of sets in the cloth, divide and that is how many pleats there can be in each set, if other factors work out.

Unfortunately when I tried it there were not the places where the fabric could be folded and stitched down to get the waist supression in the fabric I had. Well - it could be but it looked dreadfull

I was forced into pleating to the third red column, placing the stitches between two lines of yellow on the edge of the pleat, sewing down onto a fairly wide area of very dark blue which is part of the under pleat.

The ideal with tartan is to have the set centred on the front apron and the centre back - though how that is achieved if the set does not 'want' to do that is as yet a mystery.

Also bothering me is how to use a piece of the fabric as a waist band when the pattern will not match due to the waist supression - or am I being to persnickerty wanting it to match?

If you have a central strip of fabric from cutting a double width piece of cloth, I suggest using it and a lot of pins and something to stick them into - a piece of polystyrene packing maybe - or lots of safety pins and fold the fabric various ways to see what is going to work best in the way of pleating.

[KiltedKnight]

I'm new here today but my advice would be to look into 'box' pleats if the material is very thick instead of the knife pleats, I'm told they look good and the Kilt won't be so thick when finished.

[Pleater]

Box pleats would be a good idea - I have a box pleated kilt in a medium/thick desert camoflage fabric under the sewing machine foot right now.

That would be three thicknesses all around the back and four over the apron pleats, with only one place having just two layers - though some might deem that it is the most vital one of all - strategic strip of Gortex on the under apron maybe?

The camokilt looks neat, so far. It is mark 2 - the first attempt is glowering in the corner waiting to be recycled or the design thought through again.

I have a tape adding accessory for the sewing machine and I think I can round off the corners on the camokilt II and then sew a toning colour of tape over the edge of the fabric. Neater than overlocking, hemming or binding with the same thickness of fabric.

Kilt making is addictive.

[Barb T]

Hi guys

As far as pressing goes, Steve is absolutely right. Most of us are used to ironing (the sliding motion you use when ironing a shirt). Pressing is exactly that, an up and down motion with a lot of pressure. Kilts are pressed, not ironed. The steam from a damp press cloth is also crucial for a good press, which is the other reason for putting a damp cloth (I, too, use an old pillow case cut open) between the iron and the kilt.

As far as matching the top band (which isn't really a "waist band", because it lies above the waist) goes, all you can hope for is to match the tartan across the apron. It's impossible to match across the pleats or underapron unless, by some miracle, the pleats at the waist are spaced just exactly right. So, don't stress. No one tries to match anything but the apron!

Barb

[Pleater]

Doesn't match up - that's a relief.

With a view to countering the dip of the kilt back and coping with the shaping I need, I devised a cutting down of the waist band on a plain kilt.

First the aprons ware separated from the pleats by a small cut and shaped in at the top onto petersham. That meant there was no separate waistband on the aprons.

The pleats now stood up higher than the aprons, so I laid them out in a curve with the middle at about the level of the aprons - the supression seems to force a dip in the centre back. Then I checked the spacing of the pleats twice and basted the top of the pleats onto a waistband, level with the apron tops, and cut off the pleats standing above the waistband, making a straight line.

I still have lots to do on the kilt, but the shape does seem rather good. It is a small alteration, but it will give a better fit whilst not really doing a lot to the actual length of fabric.

I must start to take photographs or keep some record of how I do things - for good or ill.