So, look at Mael Colums first picture. Ern, you look great, as usual! But is that "contemporary"? I mean, the whole focus on that look is the tartan, the sporran, the hose...it's all basically traditional Scottish stuff. OK, so the shirt isn't traditional. I suppose that's contemporary.

I just don't see the point of having us go on and on and on in infinite detail about whether adding a polo shirt on top of a tartan kilt makes it "contemporary". If you're dressed to the nines in tartan kilt, hose, sporran but have leather shoes on which aren't gillies in some form, then it's "contemporary"? Well, I suppose so.

Take Erns' next picture...t-shirt, sporran, tartan kilt, and sandals with no socks. Well, is that "traditional"? Not at all. But it's still nothing like wearing an Amerikilt, Freedom Kilt (non-tartan), Gryphon Kilt, Utilikilt or camouflage X-Kilt.

Now, the cold-hard truth of the matter is that I wonder how much discussion there will be, now about those kinds of kilt. The tendency for those lads is to buy the thing, strap it on and wear it. How much minutiae is there to discuss? I really don't have a lot to say about my X Kilt or my camouflage reverse kinguisse kilt that I wear backpacking or when I'm knockin' around. Put it on, wear it.

Tartan kilts, however, have endless interations of minutiae to discuss, from weavers to accessories to clans to color of hose that coordinates and so on. So the raw material is there to discuss for years. Obviously.

IN FACT if I were all for splitting things up even more, which I'm not, I'd say that "Contemporary Kilt Wear' and the associated forum is more along the lines of..."does wearing a polo shirt and trainers with my Clan MacWitless tartan kilt qualify as contemporary?" ... and ... "What do you think of these non-brogue-ey shoes with my MacWitless kilt?" ..... and "I'm thinking about wearing a second-hand Civil-War era reporduction military mess-dress jacket with my MacWitless kilt.."

For the Utilikilt wearers, Amerikilt wearers, Gryphon Kilt wearers, R Kilt wearers, X Kilt wearers, Freedom Kilt (non-tartan) wearers, there ought to be a totally different sub-forum. The only thing is, I think it'll get next to no traffic, at all.