You can now give someone you truly love (or want to impress) a voucher for the creation of their very own, entirely unique tartan. (Or maybe you know someone you could drop hints to yourself?)

The lucky recipient can design their new tartan online, using our unique Tartan Designer feature. Or you can add on the option of expert assistance, so all they have to do is suggest the colours and any ideas they’d like to go into it, and we’ll do the rest.

The gift includes a generous eight yard length (enough for a kilt, or a skirt and accessories) of the finest pure new wool tartan, produced by D.C. Dalgliesh Tartan Mill, Scotland’s last specialist artisan tartan weavers. Or you can request finest pure spun silk if you prefer!

You can even include our help with having the design formally recorded by the official Scottish Tartans Register, so the design will be recognised forever.

The John Gray Centre will open in 2012 in East Lothian, Scotland. It will house an exhibition on Scotland’s weaving industry, featuring lengths of tartan fabric to help illustrate the skill and expertise of past and present weavers.

The display tartans are being designed as part of a competition for children from local primary and secondary schools. Groups of pupils created their setts using Tartan Mill’s advanced design software, helped by retired weavers who were only too happy to share their skills and knowledge. The winning design will be chosen next month by an expert designer and will be woven and donated by D.C. Dalgliesh, ready for display next year when the heritage centre opens its doors.

We were delighted to help with the project and hope that the exhibition encourages others to appreciate the fine skills of Scotland’s traditional artisan industries. To find out more about the John Gray Centre go to: http://www.johngraycentre.org/site/

The good news is that we’re confident that we can not only return D.C. Dalgliesh to sound health, but build on the mill’s undoubted strengths to make it a very successful enterprise for the modern age. This is great news for anyone who cares about Scottish heritage, as it keeps alive the tradition of wearing your own tartan, which would have become unaffordable for most had this mill been lost. (So if you have to pay a little more in the future, we hope you’ll agree that it’s a price worth paying for your heritage still to survive.)

Rest assured, one thing this will NOT mean will be any significant changes to the artisan production processes that that have given their tartans a reputation as simply the world’s finest quality. Ours is not the cheapest way to produce tartans, but it’s the best. (Ask any tartan expert.) So that will stay just as it is. (Check out the video on the Dalgliesh web site if you’ve not done so yet!)

We will be bringing some big improvements, both on the production side, and to the business operations. In fact we’ve already started to invest heavily in the production, building our yarn range and yarn stocks to levels never before seen. Our intention is to stock a full range of common colours (around 100 shades) all in both our heavy and light weight wools, both for consistency and immediate availability. (Special dying is also available for a surcharge).

We’ll also be bringing some spectacular enhancements to the ordering process, offering a level of custom-specification and customer-friendly convenience offered by no other weaver. All will be revealed in time.

There will also of course have to be some less popular changes… not least, of course, is that prices must rise. We’re keeping the increases as modest as possible, particularly given the soaring price of wool on world markets. And we’re taking the opportunity to simplify and update the trade price list, with lower increases on larger volumes but a bit more on the short lengths that are especially labour-intensive.

Another significant change with immediate effect is that in future D.C. Dalgliesh will be only a trade supplier. Only producers or retailers who are purchasing fabrics for resale or manufacture will deal direct with the mill in the future (which includes individual kiltmakers, making for customers). Other groups or individuals will be asked to approach a retailer (of which we intend to publish a worldwide list on the Dalgliesh site). The only exception will be members of accredited Highland Dance schools, who will still be able to order dance fabrics direct.

Finally, we’ve also now settled on our own business structure moving forward. Our existing “Scotweb” production & retail operation will in future become known as “Tartan Mill” (with a period of transition when we’ll use both names in tandem). And the Scotweb name will increasingly be used to refer to the overall group of companies, including both Tartan Mill and D.C. Dalgliesh. The operations will continue to be run entirely separately, as a producer/retailer and a manufacturer respectively.

Hope all this makes sense! Wish us luck. And we’d still love to ask for your help with raising awareness of the D.C. Dalgliesh weaving mill’s unique speciality - if you can add a link to your own site, it would be much appreciated!

Why is this so important? Because if D.C. Dalgliesh had gone to the wall, 90% of tartans would never be woven again. It would have been the end forever of a major Scottish tradition and centuries of specialist skills.

D.C. Dalgliesh Ltd, of Selkirk, Scotland, is the only weaver in the world still producing all its tartans to authentic traditional standards. No other weaver produces tartans of the same quality. And no other mill can weave you just enough for a single garment in your own family tartan, which is what most tartan enthusiasts want.

There’s a new business plan to return it to health. But we really need everyone’s support to ensure the mill survives for future generations. So we need YOU and everyone who cares about Scottish traditions to rally round and spread the word about this remarkable little gem. We don’t need your money. We just need you to help spread the word about D.C. Dalgliesh and their wonderful products. So please visit the D.C. Dalgliesh Supporters page to find out how.”

Why D.C. Dalgliesh Tartans are unique

D.C. Dalgliesh…

• weave any tartan in short lengths (from four yards). Tartan enthusiasts want their own family tartan, not just the best-selling popular designs made by bigger mills. A single skirt or kilt can be woven in any tartan.

• weave only on traditional shuttle looms giving fabrics a traditional natural or ‘kilting’ edge. This gives the ‘cut cloth’ bottom that an authentic kilt should always have, impossible to achieve on modern high-speed looms.

• produce more densely-woven fabrics than the larger mills giving a more lustrous finish, crisper pleating and better durability than other kilts.

• weave in heavier yarns than is normal elsewhere, for a premium quality. The mill uses 11oz wool for lightweight tartans where other mills typically use 9oz or 10oz, and 15oz for kilting tartans where the norm is 13oz.

• weave not only pure new wool but also pure spun silk, making them the only specialist weaver of pure spun silk tartans

Edinburgh Castle in the snow (copyright)

Last week we had thirty inches. Yes, that’s two and a half feet. 75cm. And temperatures in the glens fell to arctic lows below -20C (-4F) and not much higher in the cities - for days on end. It’s the worst freeze since at least the 1960s. And this in a climate that, despite our northerly location, is normally remarkably mild thanks to the Gulf Stream ocean current that skirts our coast.

The result has, in short, been chaos. Hundreds of drivers spent not just one but two nights stranded in their cars on the M8 motorway connecting our two largest cities, which stayed closed for days. Almost half the population (including vital service providers) never got to work. Public transport ground to a halt. Filling stations ran dry. And bread and milk (amongst lots of other things) have disappeared from many shelves. The army has been called in to clear paths to vital services. And there have of course been the inevitable and tragic deaths and injuries.

It’s hit our business too. One of our main courier companies (DHL) announced yesterday (9 Dec) that they were accepting no more parcels for pre-Christmas delivery as their depots are full to overflowing and they cannot shift what they’ve got. Fedex too turned up for their normal daily collection just once within ten days. And the post became a distant memory for days on end. (But despite this, we’re still expecting to fulfill on the vast majority of our christmas deliveries… and we’re still even accepting orders for custom-woven kilts.)

Our customers in Canada and Finland tend to be the least sympathetic. “What’s all the fuss about?” they say. “We get far worse every winter.” Well, yes. But the predictability and duration of your weather means you have an infrastructure to cope with it. You have snow chains for your tyres, and service distribution systems designed around that pattern. But snow chains don’t work for scatterings of snow that normally come and go in a few hours. Normally.

So I’m writing this piece partly just to record how immensely proud I am of our own team. One customer service advisor’s normal 20 minute commute took her three hours. But she got here. Our manager waded through several fields of thigh-high snow to reach a transport axis with anything moving, his own car being buried in drifts. But he got here. We had to implement emergency arrangements to get everyone home when the buses were called back to base. But they got there. In fact I think we lost only one person-day through the whole period (so far) on the first and worst morning.

You might even be asking yourself why. It’s called team spirit. It’s the Christmas season, and we have hundreds of customers anxiously awaiting their special packages from Scotland, to give to their loved ones on that special morning. And none of us want to let them down. This may sound corny. But it’s just how we run our business.

Regretfully we know that some are likely to be disappointed anyway, despite our very best efforts. The courier companies have a lot of catching up to do, so I myself will be driving around the country next week, ferrying boxes between our mills and our manufacturers to try to get everything made, and away, in time. The team will be working seven days, and into the evenings. We’ll upgrade shipping methods at our own expense where we have to. But with the mess so many people’s business systems are in, we know there will be some we just can’t do in time. And to all those we deeply apologise. I hope, having read this, you may just understand.

Lots of shops or web sites will sell you a kilt. And some indeed deliver a high quality garment.

But we’ve been monitoring our competitors. Most have already stopped promising Christmas delivery of even ‘stock’ goods. And it’s been weeks already since we’ve seen one guaranteeing to make an authentic kilt to wear on the big day.

But Scotweb? We’re not only taking orders for hand-made kilts (as well as many other garments). We’re still offering our unique woven-to-order service, with hand-sewn kiltmaking, so you can enjoy Christmas Day with you or your loved one wearing a custom-woven fabric in ANY rare tartan of your choice, from over ten thousand patterns!

Yes. For worldwide delivery.

We think we can do so until after this weekend. (It depends on the volume of orders.)

Think about it… Most kiltmakers take 2-3 months for even standard kilts in a small range off-the-shelf tartans - often longer. But we’re offering to especially produce a unique length of woven fabric in any recorded design, made for you by our local artisan weavers, and then have it expertly hand-sewn as a made-to-measure garment. Then we’ll get it to you, wherever you are. All in little more than a week.

And it won’t be hurried. It will still be the same premium quality of fabric, and premium standard of kiltmaking, that you get with every Scotweb kilt.

I hope we’ve made our case. Whether or not you take advantage of this offer, please remember that Scotweb is a company unlike any other. We do it oustandingly well. We do it efficiently. And we do deliver.

With our very best wishes for a wonderful Christmas, from all of us here in wintery Edinburgh.

• Price
• Fit
• Tartan
• Hygiene
• Outfit Choice
• Expertise
• Legacy
• Credibility
• Pleasure

Price - will it cost more to buy or hire a kilt?

I’ll come to this first, as it’s probably your first thought. And your instinct is probably that hiring will be cheaper than buying your own kilt. After all, a made to measure garment using eight yards or more of high quality woven wool fabric (provided you get it from a reputable producer) is not exactly an impulse purchase for most of us.

But pause to reflect for a moment. After all, even kilt hire is not exactly cheap. The kilt hire outlets have to hold large stocks which can only realistically be sent out a limited number of times before they get too shabby to market. And once you add on the costs of fitting and service, plus cleaning costs (hopefully… see below!) the saving is less than you might think.

But more importantly, it’s important here to think long-term. The exact differential will depend on many things, but as a rule of thumb if you’re likely to want to wear a kilt more than three or four times in your life, it’s probably going to be a good investment to buy your own.

Fit - will your kilt look good on you?

As we’ve already said, mostly you’re going to be wearing your kilt on special occasions when you really want to look your best. And it’s important to understand that a kilt should really always be made to measure garment - this matters much more than, say, for a business suit. A custom-fitted kilt should fit you like a glove, designed to hang from your waist, over your hips, down to your knees - with measurements to the nearest inch, or even half inch. First time wearers describe the feeling in glowing terms that they’ve never experienced before. But the garment will also look far more impressive than anything in stock sizes.

Of course, the kilt rental companies can’t possibly stock (or have available at busy times) a full range of sizes… that would mean holding thousands of items, when they can realistically usually have a few dozen at best. So their solution is to keep just a few mid-range items, with large increments (e.g. 2-3 inches) at every turn. Hire kilts tend to be made with longer straps, to suit the needs of the hirer rather than the customer, which inevitably mean the kilt won’t hang quite right. And if you’re outsize (or they’re out of stock of ‘your’ size at a busy time) you may well end up being told to accept ‘strap extenders’ which only make it look even worse.

And please don’t start me on the off-the-shelf “kilts” you’ll find on ebay or from the ‘tartan tat’ merchants that target tourists. These are really more like cheaply made ladies’ skirts. And trust me, you don’t want to turn up to a wedding or graduation wearing one of these!

Tartan - your own family plaid?

The Scottish tradition is of course to wear your own tartan. This may mean a family or clan tartan, of which there are thousands of names recorded (or, of course, you can design your own tartan!). But equally it can show an affiliation to any group with which you identify - so there are regimental tartans, regional, national, and city tartans, business tartans, and so on. The important thing is that it’s meaningful to you.

Of course the hire companies can stock only a tiny range of tartans, or else they’d need a stock room the size of a stadium. So you’ll normally find, oh, Black Watch… and Royal Stewart… maybe a Buchanan… and if you’re lucky one or two more. The result is that you’re likely not only to turn up wearing the same tartan as other guests who hired from the same place. You’ll also miss out on the tradition and inner pride of wearing your own unique heritage. And you’ll lose the fantastic conversation-starter that a kilt in your own tartan instantly becomes.

And it’s not just the choice of tartan pattern that you don’t get from kilt hire outlets. You’ll normally find their rental garments are available only in the coarser heavier weight fabrics. There’s a good reason for this. They’re more durable, and so can go through more hire cycles. But customers who purchase their own kilts mostly prefer a medium weight fabric that’s less tiring to wear. So this may not be ideal for you, especially if you’re going to be dancing at a hot wedding reception!

Hygiene - who last wore that kilt, and has it been cleaned?

Until recently, in my naivety, I myself had assumed that the kilt hire companies would always dry clean their kilts before renting them out to another customer. Well, wouldn’t you? But then I read this article. If you skip past the tiresomely pompous opinions about how you should be allowed to wear your own kilt, there’s a rather startling admission below from a Scottish hire company that kilts can come back “too unhygienic for staff to handle”. And to me this reads as saying that if the visible residue isn’t so bad, they may send the next customer out in the same garment without cleaning!

Now, maybe this doesn’t trouble you one bit. But bear in mind that quite a large proportion of kilt wearers DO prefer to ‘go commando’. Maybe for you this doesn’t conjure up unsettling images of nasty wee beasties crawling around inside, patiently awaiting the proximity of the next punter’s privates. But for me? Ewww!

Outfit - your choice, or theirs?

A kilt isn’t (usually!) worn on its own, of course, but as part of an outfit. Exactly how you put together your ensemble will depend on the occasion it’s for (formal, casual, etc.) on the impression you wish to make (restrained, impressive, etc.) on any affiliations (e.g. clan accessories) and not least on your personal taste. A full outfit can include up to a dozen or so components, including major items such as a jacket and vest, down to small accessories like the kilt pin and sgian dubh. There are a fantastic range of styles and finishes for each of these pieces, ranging from traditionally conservative to strikingly contemporary.

The advantage of owning your own kilt is that you can build up your own outfit, exactly as you want. And what’s more, by introducing additional items at relatively low cost (another more formal dress sporran, for example, you can assemble a great choice of items to ring the changes from your original daywear sporran perhaps) to give yourself a wardrobe suitable for every occasion or mood.

When you hire, unfortunately, you’re pretty much stuck with the standard pieces they’ve chosen for you. And these will almost always be most common denominator options that fewest people will find objectionable, rather than those that are particularly striking or attractive. You may even be stuck with taking (and paying for) items you don’t actually want or need, but come as part of your hire company’s standard package. Oh, and the hose will almost always be those awful white ‘single use’ hire socks, which both look and feel about as good as they sound. So if all this happens to reflect your personal taste, and the way you’d actually wish to present yourself in public, then you’re pretty lucky.

Expertise - sound advice, based on experience?

If you shop with a kilt specialist dedicated to traditional quality, like Scotweb, you’re getting not just a garment, but access to decades of specialist knowledge, experience, and advice. In fact any authentic traditional kiltmaker has most probably got into that business in the first place due to some personal enthusiasm for the traditions, and so will probably be committed to helping you take your own first steps on that wonderful journey of discovery. They’ll want to help you discover your roots, choose the right tartan with which to express your own identity, find the right fabrics and other outfit components to suit you both practically and in terms of the impression you want to make, and ensure it fits you perfectly… and so on. They have little vested interest in whether you choose one tartan or another. And crucially they’ve probably been doing this for years, and so will have built up a great deal of experience which they can share with you.

But frankly kilt hire companies have never had to do all this. Their job is ultimately to maximise the usage of their stock, to get an adequate return on their capital outlay. Let me put this simply. Who would you trust more for the best advice?

Legacy - an heirloom, to hand down?

This may or may not matter to you, especially if you’re relatively young. But it’s long been part of the Scottish tradition that a kilt is quite unlike any other garment. It’s a possession of the family, as much as of the individual. And many is the young man who takes tremendous pride in wearing a kilt that once belonged to his father, or even grandfather. And this is also a fact to ponder for those who fear that as their waistline advances together with their years, the range of adjustment that comes with any kilt may exceed its limits.

Wouldn’t you like to have something so meaningful to bequeath to your heirs, encouraging them to discover their heritage and traditions in the same way that you yourself once did? And even if such considerations seem far over the horizon, just consider that one day you might be glad to have such a wonderful gift to pass down, lurking at the back of your wardrobe. So at least give this some thought, before you reach a decision.

Credibility, and self-respect - how do you want to look?

Again, this may or may not matter to you. But it seems to me that a major factor in why so many of choose to wear a kilt is because of the paricular prestige that such a striking garment bestows on its wearer. Whether you’re going to at a gathering surrounded by others in their own kilts, or whether you’ve chosen to stand out from the identikit suits worn by the rest, there’s just something incomparably impressive about wearing your own kilt, in your own tartan.

Will a hired kilt in a standard off-the-shelf package in one of the ubiquitous tartans that don’t quite fit (which anyone with an experienced eye will instantly recognise as a hire garment) stand you in such good stead? Does this matter to you? Quite simply, that’s for you to decide.

Pleasure - that intangible feeling

I’ve left this one until last. But, as the saying goes, it’s certainly not least. My problem is that until you’ve actually worn a kilt made especially for you, in your own measurements, in your own tartan, it’s practically impossible to describe the inner glow you’ll feel every time you do so. All I can suggest is that you ask around, of others who’ve already made that choice. I’ll wager you’ll find few of them who regret their decision, whether its days or decades since they made their purchase. That, perhaps, tells you all you need to know.

Conclusion

Okay, I admit it, I’m biased. I don’t expect to convince every potential kilt hire customer that they really need to spend several times more for a purchase that’s probably their largest ever outlay on a single garment. But I hope I’ve given you a few points to ponder before reaching your decision. Always remember the adage about those who know the price of everything, but the value of nothing. Sometimes it’s worth thinking of the bigger picture.

And I can promise you, if you do decide to buy rather than hire, the process of choosing your kilt and outfit will be one of the most interesting and enjoyable experiences for a long time. And the day your first kilt arrives from the kiltmaker, ready for you to unpack and put on, will be an occasion you remember forever. So take a moment to ask yourself now… how much are such memories worth to you?

Visit the Tartan Designer

People were astonished when we released such a sophisticated piece of software, in which we’d invested months of programming time, free-of-charge. After all, it effectively replaced expert services for which previously you’d have paid many large professional fees. But to recoup some of our investment, we initially made it a contractual condition that if you produced a design there you’d ask Scotweb to produce it for you. Fair enough, you’d think.

But now we’ve gone a step further. We’ve removed even that condition, and indeed all restrictions on its use. You can now use the Tartan Designer in any (reasonable) way you like, and have your designs woven wherever and by whoever you wish. If you do so, you’ll retain full copyright, just as if you’d done your design on paper. (And of course if anyone else designs it for you, they own the copyright by law.)

Why have we done this? Well, for one thing we’re confident that our simply unbeatable pricing for woven fabrics means you’ll come to us anyway. Even a single premium quality kilt or corporate uniform made in your own unique design can cost less than a lesser garment in standard stock fabrics elsewhere. That’s the Scotweb way. And for larger volumes prices tumble further. Great news for pipe bands and companies!

But we also know that a few people were uncertain about using the Tartan Designer at all, in case they became locked into a closed system. Well, worry not. You may now use this remarkable tool without restriction. So our hope is that with even more people using the system, we might make enough extra sales to help pay for the business that goes elsewhere. So there’s no catch. No legalities. (And that means we’ve less costly admin to worry about!)

But anyway. It just feels right. We want everyone to have their own tartan, whether or not they ever have it woven. Whether you have Scottish blood or not, displaying our shared identity by wearing a shared tartan is part of our heritage. It’s our joy. It’s our fascination. So please help spread the word!

Click to enlarge

At the Checkouts, they promote things like food and sweets. I picked up a bag of Daim sweets, prominently marked as £2.99. At the checkout I was charged £3.32. The lower price was only available to Family card holders. The full price in solid black ink was roughly ten times higher (i.e. 100x more dominant) than the real, tiny grey-ink price.

This must surely contravene Trading Standards regulations on clear pricing. I am sure it also contravenes the Disability Discrimination Act, as my own eyesight is far from poor, but there’s no way I’d have seen the smaller price. Anyone elderly or with a visual disability would stand no chance.

The dominant number is also the rounded ‘price point’ as used for standard pricing throughout the store. The real price is a odd-pennies number that would never normally appear on a standard price at Ikea.

Think this is trivial? Few people will notice the extra on their receipt, and fewer still complain. If this is more than a single example at a single store, over time it will net IKEA millions by deliberate deception. I think there’s a word for that.

But words only go so far. So here’s something to let you see for yourself just how much work and centuries of traditional skill go into the production of every single piece of Harris Tweed. If you have seven minutes or so of your life to spare, watch our video on The Making of Harris Tweed. I promise you’ll look at the fabric with a new found appreciation.

I did.