I thought this would be helpful to get on the forum for future reference. I just saw an invitation from a local Scottish Society for a Saint Andrews Day Dinner defining the dress code as "evening attire (dressy or Scottish) is encouraged".

While I won't be attending the event I am quite curious. Is evening attire equivalent to black tie? Does it align more with cocktail attire? If I was attending I would of course contact the sponsoring group and ask what they mean, but it seems unnecessarily complicated to come up with new terms when there is a standard set of terms to define the type of dress for an event.

Point being, for the sake of the rabble having a thread to find when they search for the question, what is evening attire?