White Kilt Hose

[Jay]

I have no issue with white or cream hose. Nor a problem with lovat blue or lovat green.

It's all about the outfit. If I am wearing tan hiking boots and a cream sweater with a red kilt, red or black hose would look out of place.

White hose with a dark tartan and black Peince Charlie would be like wearing white socks with a black tuxedo.


As with all things fashion, consider the individual item against the outfit, not in its' own or against an outfit not being worn. Anything less is kilt koppish.

[warrior]

Since I'm new to the kilt I really can't opined on white hose with the kilt. I do however get the very real mental image of balding aging males of the snowbird type somewhere on a south Florida beach in baggy bermudas pulled up to their chins and down below pure white tube socks pulled high.
I shall never fall afoul of Jock's sartorial wrath as I can proudly say there is not a single white foot covering of any type in my wardrobe. I was raised to believe white socks were strictly of the athelic type and to be worn no where else. Of course my midsection is reason enough to believe I own no white socks.

[kiltedjoss]

A few kilt hire companies have pushed off-white on me. I have off-white, black, and green pairs of hose. I use my tartan matching flashes with my white and I use my red flashes with my green hose. Either go with my black hose depending upon how I feel and what else I'm wearing.

[Sir William]

Being a kilt-wearer since the mid 1970s, I've observed three phases of this thing that might be called the White Hose Era....

My experience was similar. When I began wearing a kilt in the early 1980s, I saw lovat blue or lovat green predominantly worn for daywear, white or tartan for evening wear.

Today I love wearing different colors of hose with my kilt and reserve my white hose for when I'm in my SAMS uniform. I'm not totally opposed to white (in its various shades) for evening wear, but I don't care much for it during the day.

I personally prefer wearing a balmoral when kilted. I have a flat cap that I like wearing from fall to spring but I don't wear it with a kilt since I fear Jock Scot's scorn and disdain.

[Nighthawk]

I always enjoy a good white hose 'rammy'* (as we say in this part of the world) and this opportunity to round off the year is not one to be missed. Not coming from a background where your dress was prescribed by a written code and where even your very thoughts were regimented in a particular direction, I have had the luxury of forming my own choices as to what I wear and how I wear it. White, although not strictly defined to be a colour, is, nevertheless, generally regarded as such. That any one individual should then decide that one particular colour from the spectrum of shades available must on no account be worn surely belies belief but that is the fact that we all must face.
I think we all now know that old story about the kilt-hire companies foisting white hose upon us as a cheap option, although I do recall kilt-hire in the 1960's coming with tartan hose (and a shoulder plaid). The only assumption I can make from this is that wearing white (or off-white) hose smacks to the beholder as the wearer being a cheapskate who can't afford his own outfit and that the beholder may condescendingly look down upon such a tainted individual in the way that such snobs have done since time immemorial. We can imagine stone age man looking down upon his neanderthal neighbour because the animal skin wrapped around him was too short or some other feature allowed him to feign superiority over another human being. It is human nature after all - Burns wrote of it in 'The man's a man for a that' and everyone will have experienced it at some time or another.
I think what I am trying to say is that every individual should have the freedom to make their own choices as to how they dress and that no-one has the right to criticise their choice provided that it does not offend the generally accepted standards of decency within society. I can well imagine the type of reaction certain individuals might display at someone in white hose not being 'one of us' or 'who let the hoi-polloi in' but that is a deficiency in their character and outlook and not one I could ever espouse. So there you have it

*rammy (Scots) - a free-for-all, a disturbance, scuffle

You know, I tend to agree. I don't look down on the wearer of white hose as being too cheap. It just looks to my like a lack of imagination, and I leave it at that. I try to pick hose colors that compliment the tartan. The best example I can give is my Colorado state tartan kilt. That tartan looks spectacular with forest green hose. The green hose really bring out the colors of the kilt. If I were to wear white with that kilt, it just wouldn't look as good. My only question is- with all the wide and varied choices in colors, why would one choose to limit oneself to white?

Examples of ways to get creative:



I personally am wearing my pair of these as I type this:







Most of these can be had in very neutral colors that would look good with any tartan! I will never bother with white hose because I have so many options available to me! These fine selections can all be found at http://giftshop.scottishtartans.org/hose_intro.html

[Jack Daw]

I wear them sometimes when I pipe with other pipers; otherwise, I would prefer to make sock puppets out of them and give them away at Xmas. I see white hose for semi-formal and formal just as inappropriate with the kilt as with a tuxedo.

[James Hood]

There exists somewhere in this consciousness, the query...

..."Who the flop cares?"

[John_Carrick]

I agree with the general view of (off) white hose but really don't know what the best colour is for Dress McLeod. Any tips please?
John

[Nighthawk]

I agree with the general view of (off) white hose but really don't know what the best colour is for Dress McLeod. Any tips please?
John

Reds are great! Claret or tartan red are colors that I would wear. I would also think a weathered green, like lovat green, would look fantastic as well My wife says that she thinks black would look good with it. One of these days, I'll have a kilt in that tartan. But as it is, all I currently have is a MacLeod of Harris. By the way, I love the kilt. It looks great.

[macwilkin]

Since I'm new to the kilt I really can't opined on white hose with the kilt. I do however get the very real mental image of balding aging males of the snowbird type somewhere on a south Florida beach in baggy bermudas pulled up to their chins and down below pure white tube socks pulled high.
I shall never fall afoul of Jock's sartorial wrath as I can proudly say there is not a single white foot covering of any type in my wardrobe. I was raised to believe white socks were strictly of the athelic type and to be worn no where else. Of course my midsection is reason enough to believe I own no white socks.

Real, authentic Bermudas are not baggy, and not worn with white tube socks, but with essentially kilt hose. It's a shame that the name "Bermudas" has been corrupted; I love the traditional dress of the Somers Isles.

T.