The Creative World of Tartan

The Creative World of Tartan
©2010 Matthew A. C. Newsome, GTS, FSA Scot

The new Scottish Register of Tartans has been getting some press lately and not all of it favorable. In a recent article in the Scotsman (Jan. 31, 2009), Martyn McLaughlin expressed the frustrations of many when he complained that the Register seems to be accepting “a flurry of ‘vanity’ patterns from around the world onto the official tartans register.” This type of activity is seen to “cheapen” the status of the Register itself.

I must admit, I have heard the same frustrations expressed by other tartan enthusiasts with which I correspond. Anyone can visit the Scottish Register of Tartans web site and sign up to receive email alerts when a new tartan is added into the system. At least once a week you will receive one (or sometimes several) notifications of new tartans, with names such as “Clan MacEvil” (for a US club of kilt wearers), or “Cailleach” (from a Maine based designer “in honor of the Goddess who is honored and celebrated through the Winter,” according to the design notes).

When people see new tartans such as these in their inbox on a weekly basis, it is easy to conclude that the “tartan craze” is out of hand. However, in many respects this is business as usual in the tartan world. The creation of new tartans, many frivolous and destined to never be put into large-scale production, has been going on for centuries. It is simply not something that the average person has been able to easily track until recently.

Before the national Register was founded, the International Tartan Index maintained by the Scottish Tartans Authority already contained over 7000 entries. These included traditional clan and family tartans, as well as many historic examples of interest to specialists and researchers. But a good number of them were modern designs, created either by individuals who wanted a tartan to wear or woolen mills wanting a fresh new design to bring to market.

Some look upon this as a cultural tragedy, a “selling out” of Scotland’s iconic tartan tradition. The irony is that those who express this opinion are themselves adhering to a false image of tartan’s place in Scotland’s history. The dominant view for some time has been that tartan is a type of heraldry (which is why many still insist the Lord Lyon is the ultimate tartan authority, a claim that office has repeatedly rejected). They view tartan as a regulated system of identification where a clan chief will have his or her approved tartans which the members of the clan are “entitled” to wear; anything else is simply not an “authentic” Scottish tartan.

While clan chiefs certainly have the prerogative to determine what is and is not their clan tartan, the fact remains that tartan has never been limited to this relatively narrow usage. What the Scotsman article decries as “vanity” tartans have always been with us.

The first thing to recall is that tartan, whatever else it may be, is an industry. It is a product, a textile which has been woven and worn as part of the Highland Dress for centuries. The earliest tartan weavers created patterns on the loom, and generally would have produced cloth in small batches. One wonders just how many tartan patterns woven once and made into a suit of clothing, or perhaps a blanket, never to be produced again? Prior to the industrialization (and subsequent standardization) of the tartan weaving industry, variation was no doubt the norm.

This was before the concept of named tartans held sway, one must realize. People commonly wore tartan, but no one thought that a particular tartan “meant” anything. In fact, even when the first tartans were given names, it was simply for identification and not to imply any particular usage. The early tartan firm of William Wilson and Sons of Bannockburn gave their Aberdeen tartan its name most likely because it sold well in that city, not because only Aberdonians were “entitled” to wear it.

It is in the records of that distinguished tartan manufacturer that we find early evidence of “vanity” tartans being produced. A letter to them from Mr. David Forfar, dated July 25, 1796, requests production of the Red Gordon tartan, but with several color changes. The notes in the national Register for this tartan (No. 641) point out that this “illustrates the custom at the time to order tartan with some variation to suit individual requirements yet based on the traditional family or district sett.”

One hundred years later we read the opinion of The Hon. Stuart Ruaidri Erskine, author of The Kilt and How to Wear It (1901). In that book he writes of unnamed tartan patterns which he calls “hill checks.” He laments that “this pretty custom of wearing ‘hill checks’ has fallen into disuse. Apart from sentimental reasons, it is a very agreeable pastime the designing of these tartans. I have designed not a few of them myself… I have tartans for hill wear and tartans for low country wear, and tartans for spring, summer, autumn and winter.”

For times when one is representing one’s clan (at a Highland Games, for instance), Erskine advocates wearing the recognized clan tartan. But for general kilt wear, he strongly recommends the practice of creating your own original designs. What he calls “hill checks” would be called “vanity tartans” today.

So if you are one of those who find yourself aflutter at the seeming onslaught of new tartan designs, rest easy. This is actually a continuation of a very old tradition. It is only the record keeping system which is new, bringing many tartans to light which would in earlier times be known only to those wearing them.

Granted, not all new designs are created equal. A tartan scholar or a textile designer will have a much better chance at creating a design which is not only inspired by tradition but will likely endure into the future. An amateur who downloads free design software and spends half an hour clicking a mouse will not have the same success rate. For this reason, anyone who is interested in having a new design created is strongly recommended to contact a tartan expert, at least for consultation.

Lastly, one final advantage of wearing your own “vanity” tartan which cannot be overstated – you’ll never be accused of wearing the wrong one!