Please tell me if I'm being told lies by my bad bf......

[xman]

A kilt is a skirt no matter who wears it. Nomenclature is not intended to limit, but merely describe accurately for the sake of comprehension. Not all skirts are kilts. To be a form of kilt it should have pleats in back and aprons in front.

A military style kilt, whether worn by men or women, say in a pipe band or as a highland dancer or athlete, may for simplicity be called simply a kilt.
A mini kilt is shorter and intended for, please only, women.
Kilts over the knee are referred to as kilted skirts or kilt skirts.
Kilts to the ground are called hostess skirts and are considered formal.

Dancers and athletes of either sex are required to wear undies. Soldiers are required not to. What you as a civilian do is entirely your own business and not even your boyfriend's if you don't want him to know.

[Father Bill]

What you as a civilian do is entirely your own business and not even your boyfriend's if you don't want him to know.

But if you want to keep him on the hook, wondering all night, you could always drop some devious non-clues.

[O'Callaghan]

A kilt is a skirt no matter who wears it. Nomenclature is not intended to limit, but merely describe accurately for the sake of comprehension. Not all skirts are kilts. To be a form of kilt it should have pleats in back and aprons in front.

A military style kilt, whether worn by men or women, say in a pipe band or as a highland dancer or athlete, may for simplicity be called simply a kilt.
A mini kilt is shorter and intended for, please only, women.
Kilts over the knee are referred to as kilted skirts or kilt skirts.
Kilts to the ground are called hostess skirts and are considered formal.

Dancers and athletes of either sex are required to wear undies. Soldiers are required not to. What you as a civilian do is entirely your own business and not even your boyfriend's if you don't want him to know.

I think this is the definitive answer above.

By military style, he apparently means a kilt that is approximately knee length. As he says, that would be just a regular kilt or a ladies' kilt as appropriate. The side it fastens determines the gender it is intended for in exactly the same way as, for example, a jacket, although in the case of pipe bands usually everyone wears kilts that fasten on the men's side.

I think for a celidh a regular ladies' kilt might be best, but it is many years since I attended one, and most of the people there were not in highland dress when I did, so I am not really the right person to ask.

Men seem to be stuck with knee length. If I say that wasn't always so, someone else will disagree and off we will go at a tangent. Where it should fall relative to the knee is the subject of many tedious threads! Mid-knee if you're in the army, otherwise you only have the fashion police to consider.

I have seen women wear a sporran, but it's not usual. Mostly if they do it means they are in a pipe band, but not always. At a festival it would not be out of the ordinary, but at a celidh it would look out of place.

Someone else mentionned billie kilts. That is not exactly a standard mini kilt, but also has a band of fabric at the top with the tartan pattern (the sett, as it's called) cut on the bias. Why they are called that is a mystery to me, but is a common style in ladies' highland wear. Probably someone selling them called them that and it stuck.

One of these days I'm going to get a kilt for my wife, probably long but not floor length, so it would be considered a kilted skirt. Actually, it will have to be exactly the length she wants(!), which is perhaps between a kilted skirt and a hostess kilt. It will cost more than any of mine, though, as it will use more fabric and she will only wear her clan tartan (she is partly Scots and I'm partly Irish, and I am content to wear generic Irish kilts).