Novice tailor tackles X-kilt

[fluter]

Thirty-some years ago, someone showed me a sewing machine. I was allowed to make a few seams. Fast forward to 2007, and my true-love cleverly gave me a novice-friendly sewing machine for my birthday.

Having experimented with modifying a canvas blazer, I obtained some cotton twill, and set forth with the X-kilt instructions. Other novices take heart: while I have some mechanical inclinations, I have to count my fingers before using power tools, to be sure I end up with the same number when finished.

I found at first that a 2-by-4 foot drawing table is not necessarily the best place to iron and organize a 5-by-12 foot piece of fabric. However, I had it on hand, having built it for other reasons, and that's where I had set up the sewing machine in my underground Fortress of Solitude [a.k.a. the basement where SWMBO dares not tread---because it's too full of stuff].



Once the cutting was done, though, the table came into its own. That steel ruler on the edge turns out to be very handy with the trusty framing square as well as for measurements. How clever of me to have put it there 20-odd years ago!



If I keep the fabric rolled somewhat neatly, the job progresses nicely through sewing many pleat edges.

[ more to come ]

[fluter]

X-kilt in progress. Let me describe how I worked the taper of the fell, and perhaps someone will suggest a better way. We have the box-pleats marked, pressed, sewed along the edges, and bar-tacked at the fell line.

Hint: don't press the top of the box-pleats above the fell-line, or press only lightly. If they are pressed hard, they will resist our trying to make a new fold for the taper.

Say that I want to take a half-inch from pleat #5, near the middle. I pinch one quarter-inch back from the left edge, and make a new fold from here down to the fell line. There is now a quarter-inch gap between 5 and 6. Smoothing the fold underneath, I bring it to the center-line between 5 and 6, and pin. Repeat for the right edge, towards pleat 4.

Hint: perhaps I am just a klutz, but I find it better if both sides are pinned in the same direction. Removing pins is the same when sewing either side, and handling the piece seems to call for fewer blood-sacrifices to the hungry sewing deities. There are fewer bloodstains to deal with, also.

Here the the tapered fells have been sewed down; but we have not yet ripped out and re-done the imperfect ones!



Here is a view from the inside, after tacking down the top of the fell.



One cautionary note: sew in a straight line for just a couple of pleat widths, then turn to match the curve of the top. I went too far near pleats 2-3, and again in the middle: thus going too far down from the top edge. At the time, I was planning a wide waistband that could cover a multitude of such pecadillos. Needless to say, my plans changed. One set was ripped out and re-done; the other---well, I decided I'd be wearing a belt anyway!

I have let the extra material taper out toward the top, mirroring the narrowing taper of the outside. I don't know whether this is optimal, or whether it would be better to fold it over itself within the bounds of each pleat. It's not crucial here, as half an inch per side is the most I've tapered. The adjacent pleats do not overlap by too much.

[fluter]

Here then is the final result, fore and aft:



There are some faults, but this is why we learn with inexpensive cotton! I understand my brethren's references to kilts for yard work! but as a first project, I feel good about it.

I have made the classic mis-reading, and considered the 3-inch "forward facing" side of the first/last pleats to yield a 1.5 inch half-pleat. That could certainly be deeper, as I should know from playing with my SWK and other kilts.

The left corner of the apron seems destined to curl up. this may have to do with the A-shaping, or perhaps I pulled the back of the underpleat in a funny way. I did sew down the edge of that underpleat, and perhaps I missed. Deepening the front half of the first pleat might help, as well.

I have pretty good sized under-apron pleats on both sides (5 and 6 inches). Perhaps a bit more would be better.

In my most dramatic "oops," I re-ordered the steps in "measure twice, cut once." I had just re-figured my length, coming up with a slightly shorter figure than before; and when I cut, I left out a generous hem allowance. D'oh! Yet all is not lost: it was a high-rise X-kilt, now it's a low-rise one. There is plenty of fabric on the other side for a nice high-rise Mark 1 A1 model!

Almost forgot my most pressing question: with a 9-10 inch over apron, what is optimum size of the under-apron??? I'm about the size of the hypothetical guy in Appendix 1 diagram, but was not very sure what was included in the 16 inch allocation for the under apron. I extended a bit with a deep (6") apron pleat, then made the apron 10 inches wide. I'll wear it a while and see what happens.

[auld argonian]

An admirable achievement!

Best

AA

[James MacMillan]

Looks good! And just think about the next one!!!!

[McJore]

that looks very nice, im planning on making one also

[Arizona Scot]

Looks good to me, you have more talent and patience than I.

[Alan H]

I think you did a fantastic job. That looks great, whether it's perfect or not. If you make another one, it will be that much better, right? No worries!

[McFarkus]

I'm impressed. Don't worry, none of your shows to my novice eye.

[Pleater]

Well I wouldn't mind walking along behind that - admiring the swing, of course, and the sewing, naturally.

Mind you, I might also be thinking 'sheesh thats the first one? What's the fifth one going to be like?'

I have given up sewing the edges of aprons.

I make a small fold, usually 2 inches deep,on the edges of the aprons and then press it so it narrows to nothing at the lower edge or top of the hem, but sewing it just meant that every edge of every apron was not quite right. I blame the flare of female hip bones for throwing the line completly off, so you'll have to think of some other excuse for it happening on your kilt.

I let the inner edge of the fold dip at the waist, just slightly, so it does not pull the fold under the apron, and the apron lies flat when the fold is pressed in. (Actually that could be what is pulling the left hand of your apron, the top edge of the fabric underneath is pulled too high for it to hang straight).

After most of the construction is sewn though, I usually let it sort itself out.

Sometimes I wear the kilt for a while around the house, then put a pin where the aprons are folding and press in a line up from that. I do sometimes have to unpress the carefully made straight fold because it is just not wanting to fold there in wear. As long as it looks OK, why fight it?