'There's More to Making a Kilt
Than Meets the Eye'
By CATHOLINE BUTLER
VANCOUVER - When you think of kilt makers, you think Scotland not Ireland. But expert kilt maker, Timothy Ronald Joseph Patrick McMahon or just Tim McMahon as he is known, was born in the Coombe in Dublin, which makes him a real Dubliner.
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| TIM MCMAHON |
McMahon has been making kilts since 1959 and his skill has taken him to many parts of the world, he has even slept in an igloo in the Arctic. He has made kilts for the Royal family, including Prince Charles and the Queen Mother. He has also made kilts for Lairds of Scotland and army generals. He has even made kilts for Ugandan dictator Idi Amin who loved kilts and said a kilt was a manly dress.
I recently spoke with Tim McMahon and asked him how an Irishman became such an expert kilt maker.
"There's a lot more to making a kilt than meets the eye," said McMahon. "You need to know what you're doing when you make a kilt. They are made up on a set and you need to follow the lines exactly.
"Then you have the military set, which is on the line like the Seaforth Highlanders and Gordon Highlanders and that's easy to mark out. There's a difference between a real kilt and the fashion kilts.
"The real kilt is known as the 'little kilt,' while the ladies wear fashion or walking kilts and the long evening kilt. But one kilt that I will never ever dream of making is the utility kilt, because I think they're terrible."
McMahon's kilt making experience started at the age of 16 when he went to England and joined the British Army. He served in the Kings Royal Irish Hussars, where he joined the band and played clarinet.
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| TIM McMAHON is shown above in 1959 with his kilt-making instructor Len Penrose. |
He also did a lot of tailoring for the band and after about five years, Tim decided to take up tailoring for real, so he transferred to the Ordnance Corps because they had a tailoring school. After he finished the four week course in tailoring he was transferred to the Black Watch Depot in Perth, Scotland.
"I'll never forget landing in Scotland,' McMahon said, "It was Christmas Eve 1957 and it was just freezing cold. I was in Perth for a year and then I went on my master kilt making course in 1959.
"After the course I was sent to the Gordon Highlanders in Germany. In 1962, I was appointed by Her Majesty the Queen as master tailor to the Black Watch. While in Germany I met the Canadian Black Watch and I also did work for them.
"Eventually the Canadian Black Watch offered me a job in Canada at Gagetown, New Brunswick. I remember, landing in Halifax on November 11, 1965, that's 41 years ago, this past Remembrance Day.
"I was met on the plane in Fredericton by a piper and the RSM of the Black Watch and they treated me just fantastically, I couldn't believe it. In 1966, I was asked to go to Cape Breton to make kilts and jackets for the Cape Breton Highlanders because of the Queen Mother's visit there.
"In 1973 I decided I'd like to see some other parts of Canada so I moved to Montreal and the first kilt that I made there was for the piper of the Ogilvies department store. Then news spread and I started getting other work.
"In the meantime, I decided to take up bartending as a hobby but it got serious, so I'd do tailoring in the daytime and bartending at night. Sometimes, I'd be finishing at four in the morning.
"Later, I was offered a job in the Arctic as bar manager of the Resolute Hotel in Resolute Bay, where I spent 12 months. I continued with the tailoring because people from Montreal kept sending me work to do on kilts.
"When I finished my 12 months in Resolute Bay, I checked the map and decided to go to Calgary because the weather didn't look to be too bad there. So, in 1977 I arrived in Calgary and that was the year that Prince Charles was Parade Marshal of the Calgary Stampede.
"I got in touch with a Scottish shop in Calgary and they couldn't believe that I could make kilts. They gave me some kilted fashion skirts to make and from then on word spread and I started doing work for the Calgary Highlanders, the Calgary Police Pipe Band, The Canmore Three Sisters Legion and all over Alberta.
"I became the Calgary Police tailor. It was in Alberta that I decided I wasn't going to do any more general tailoring. I would only stick to kilt making, kilts, kilted skirts and evening kilts."
In 1990, after spending 14 years in Calgary, Tim decided to move to Vancouver. Here, he outfitted the Langley Pipe Band, the Sechelt Legion, the Powell River Legion, and all the White Spot Bands.
Because of long wait times for kilts in Scotland, McMahon often gets orders from Scotland. He has also made kilts for tourists from Scotland while they visit Vancouver. It takes Tim three days to make a kilt and he estimates the working time at approximately 10 hours.
For anyone interested in learning more about tartans, clans and family history of Scotland, Tim recommends a book entitled The Clans and Tartans of Scotland by Robert Bain.
Like many Celts, who dream of someday returning home, Tim McMahon's long range plans also include returning to the old sod. For more information about kilt making, call Tim McMahon at (604) 408-5178.
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