Kathryn Corry is about to beat a path to Europe, drumming in pipe bands on the way to the music's spiritual home in Scotland.
Once there, Ms Corry plans to add to her kilt-making skills, skills she plans to bring back to Dunedin.
The Otago Polytechnic teaching and research assistant will first head for Switzerland's Basel Tattoo, the world's second-largest military tattoo after the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, in mid-July.
She will drum there with the Temuka Pipe Band, with which she has travelled from Dunedin to practise and play for the past 10 years, because of both the people involved and the quality of the band.
The band was invited to play at the tattoo and, with grants and fundraising helping Ms Corry to get to Europe, she took the opportunity to apply to play for the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo's Pipers' Trail.
She was accepted for a position in the group that takes bagpiping, drumming and dancing to the community in Scotland, in an attempt to build its appeal, and get international players involved.
''I think I'm the only one from Australasia going,'' she said.
From there, Ms Corry will travel to Keith, in northeast Scotland, and take a course at the Keith Kilt and Textile Centre.
Upon her return to Dunedin, the Otago Polytechnic bachelor of design graduate plans to go into kilt making full-time.
Of her opportunities overseas, she said it was ''kind of a big deal''.
The musicians were ''a good group of people to be involved with.
''It's traditional, it's musical, and it keeps my brain ticking over.''
