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How to make a Kilt

The need to wear a kilt is probably the biggest deterrence of potential Scottish athletes from competing. Options are: buy an authentic, hand-made kilt for about $300-400 (some entry fee!), borrow a kilt from someone, possibly rent one from a costume shop, find one in a garage sale, or make your own.

I have made my own kilt for Scottish athletic competitions. I made it out of a clearance remnant of rayon fabric from the Piece Goods shop. It was the only fabric that I could find that had an authentic tartan pattern. It was a Rob Roy MacGregor, black and red check (adopted by the Lamar Alexander presidential campaign). So I take this 4-yard piece of tablecloth and make a pretty decent-looking kilt out of it. Total price: about $12 and a day at the sewing machine.

I think that anyone with a sewing machine and some sewing experience can make a kilt. You can make a no-frills, bare-bones kilt for athletic competition for about $15-25, depending upon how much the fabric costs. I would recommend looking for a 3-yard remnant and sewing it together in the middle to make a 6-yard piece. I would pleat half setts. This is not going to look like the expensive kilts, but it will be enough to get by for an athletic competition.

You need to find the February/March 1991 issue of Threads magazine, in the library or piece goods shop. In it, there is a complete article on how to make a kilt, by Ann Stewart. This article on kilts is not online. However, it has been reprinted by Threads in "Techniques for Casual Clothes," You can order that by calling customer service at 800-888-8286.

I greatly simplify the kilt from the article's instructions. First, I only used 4 yards of cheap rayon fabric. In the future, I would recommend 6 yards, but you certainly don't need 8 yards. Rayon fabric seems to hang well; cotton would not hang well or keep the pleats properly. Also, I did not use any lining. For the buckles, I took the buckles and nylon straps from an old knapsack bookbag.

Oh, and also I did all the sewing by machine. I sewed each pleat down from the waistline to the hipline. You just have to make sure everything is pinned down flat, and there should be no problem. Also, you can use velcro to substitute for the left (inner front panel) buckle, but you should definitely have the outer panel (right side) buckle. I use a velcro strip about 1" wide and 8" long along the waistline, fastening the under front panel to the over front panel, off centered to the left.

If anyone makes their own kilt, let me know how it turns out, or add some extra tips, so that I can incorporate them into this page.

length: I would recommend getting the bottom edge to hang right at the top of your kneecap. Another way is to kneel on the floor and measure to the ground, and use that measurement for your total length.

REFERENCES:

Making a Kilt by Grand Chain.

FOLKWEAR at 67 Broadway, Asheville, North Carolina, 28801. 1-800-284-3388 contact Kate Mathews. They have pattern (#152) for a kilt.