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"Buying your Kilt - Made Easy"
An Expert Insider's Frank Views and Simple Tips by Dr Nicholas J Fiddes (Governor, Scottish Tartans Authority)
- Why you should wear a kilt, and what kind of kilt to get
- How to source true quality, and avoid the swindlers
- Find your own tartans, and get the best materials
- Know the outfit for any occasion, and understand accessories
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HANDY GUIDE TO
BUYING A KILT
A review of
Kilts & Tartan Made Easy by Dr. Nicholas J.
Fiddes
©2006 Matthew A. C.
Newsome, FSA Scot, GTS
published in the
Scottish Banner, December 2006
Dr. Nick Fiddes,
governor of the Scottish Tartans Authority, and
founder of Scotweb, has recently produced a handy
little 58 page ebook on kilt wearing that is
available to anyone with internet access free of
charge. Just point your web browser to
www.clan.com/kiltsandtartan.
Fiddes is deeply
involved in the tartan industry, having his own
Highland Dress supply company. To his credit, he
does a good job of rising above commercial concern
to produce a document that a new kilt wearer will
find handy, whether he’s ordering his kilt from
Fiddes’ business, another kiltmaking firm, or an
individual kiltmaker. Fiddes does, on a few
occasions, recommend his own company – but why
shouldn’t he! He lets the reader know up front his
affiliation, and if a man doesn’t feel confidant in
recommending his own service, he should not be in
the business.
In the end, what you
have with this text is the personal thoughts and
advice of Dr. Fiddes, and not a Scotweb
advertisement. He lets you know what other Highland
Dress suppliers he recommends and is comfortable
buying from, and he also lets you that there are
some disreputable suppliers out there, and gives
advice on how to spot them.
This is perhaps the most
valuable aspect of this ebook. The section that I
think will be most useful to new kilt buyers deals
with how to select a kilt maker; specifically how to
spot a cheat! Some may not like to admit it, but
there are a lot of purveyors of questionable kilts
out there, who will gladly pass off a poor-quality
product as the epitome of Highland tradition. Or
they will sell you a quality product under false
pretenses.
I recall once in the
Scottish Tartans Museum looking up the name of a
visitor and, discovering that it was affiliated with
no clan, recommended the appropriate district tartan
for the name’s place of origin in Scotland. “No, I
think we are MacDonalds,” the man said. So checked
another reference, and there was no clan affiliation
there, either. “I’m pretty sure we are MacDonalds,”
he insisted.
So I looked in a third
reference where I found a detailed history of his
family name. Not only was there no mention of Clan
MacDonald, but the family lived on the complete
opposite side of Scotland! So I asked the gentleman
why he thought he was a MacDonald. It turned out
that on a recent trip to Scotland someone in a
tartan shop told him that was his tartan and sold
him (at a premium!) a full kilted outfit. That is
the kind of mistake that Fiddes is hoping to help
people avoid with Kilts & Tartan Made Easy.
Fiddes also gives advice
on how to select a kilt style, how to select a
tartan, and the proper way to accessorize. He does
a good job of breaking down the basics when it comes
to sporrans, jackets, belts, bonnets, hose and the
like. He says right up front that his advice is
meant only as that – advice on how to dress well for
certain special events. “Otherwise,” he writes,
“never let anyone tell you that you are wearing it
wrong.” Here, here! The kilt is not a uniform!
I had a Scottish
gentleman who was retired military inform me once
that the fold over on my kilt hose was an inch too
short, or maybe too long – regardless it was not
regulation! I had to remind him, politely, that I
was not in the military and not wearing a uniform.
I think a lot of kilt wearers would be more at ease
if they better understood this principle. The kilt
is clothing, and like any other form of clothing,
you are free to accessorize it how you see fit.
That being said, there
is such a thing as fashion sense, and guidebooks
like this can help you make certain decisions. But
feel free to disagree with published opinions.
Fiddes, for example, says never to mix tartans in
the same outfit. He says that it is fine to wear
the same tartan woven by different mills, even
though the patterns may not exactly match. But one
would never wear more than one tartan at a time,
even if the colors were complimentary.
My advice is the
opposite. I’ve seen people mix tartans with great
flare and panache! One gentleman I know wears a
white mess jacket with lapels and cuffs of one
tartan, a vest of a second tartan, his kilt in a
third tartan, and cadadh (traditional hose
made from tartan cloth) of a fourth. I wouldn’t
recommend this to the faint of heart, but my friend
pulls it off quite well, because he has a very good
sense of his own personal style.
On the other hand, I
think wearing the same tartan, but from two
different mills (the kilt from Lochcarron and the
fly plaid from House of Edgar, for example) would be
ill advised. Here the tartans would be almost
the same, but just slightly different in either
color tone or sett size. To my eye, this would be
more visually jarring.
Aside from a few minor
points of disagreement, such as the above, the only
real disappointment I had with this work is its
treatment of different kilt styles. Ignoring the
more contemporary styles of kilt (such as utilikilts,
and other modern fashions, which do get mention),
Fiddes breaks kilts down into primarily two
categories; the “full” eight yard kilts, and the
“casual” five yard kilts.
Eight yard kilts, in his
estimation, are what you want for any formal
occasion, and are the epitome of the kilt world.
Five yard kilts are fine, and while you may get by
with one for formal wear in a pinch, they are really
intended for casual wear. And that’s it.
I would disagree with
this designation of formal or casual by yardage.
Readers of my column know that I favor the
traditional style of box pleated kilts that require
only four yards. These can certainly be worn to any
formal event. In fact, I wore one to my own
wedding! And there is nothing intrinsic to a knife
pleated kilt made from five yards of cloth that
would prevent it being worn to a formal occasion,
either. I have made several of these.
I say that so long as
the kilt is made from quality cloth (and Fiddes has
a very good section dealing with what constitutes
good quality kilt cloth), and is hand made by a
competent kilt maker, any kilt can be worn to any
occasion. What makes the outfit formal or casual
are the various accessories that are worn with it.
Kilts & Tartan Made
Easy will help you through the process of
selecting a tartan, selecting a cloth weigh, a
woolen mill, and even a kilt maker. Whether you
wind up ordering from Fiddes’ company, Scotweb, one
of the other suppliers he recommends, or just
finding a good local supplier on your own, the
general principles set forth in this little booklet
should serve you well. There is too much confusion
surrounding Scotland’s national dress as it is.
Anything that can be done to simply things (both for
the neophyte and the old timer) is a welcome
addition.
