I think a solid colored tie is always a safe choice. You can wear a tie to match the dominant color of your kilt, or to tie in (no pun intended, but enjoy it anyway) with one of the minor colors.

In the photo on my main home page, I'm wearing a solid tie to match the tartan in both my kilt and vest:
http://www.albanach.org/

With this particular tartan, I thought matching the dominant color to be the best bet. Whether you choose to match the dominant color or not will depend a lot upon the colors of your tartan, and the look you are going for. For example, the Grant tartan has a small azure stripe, and wearing a light blue tie to accent that looks fabulous, in my opinion.

I don't often wear matching tartan ties. In fact I don't think I even have a picture of myself in one. But I do have one tie that matches one of my kilts, and to my memory the only times I have worn it have been with an open Argyle jacket, sans vest, as you see in the picture in the upper right of this page:
http://giftshop.scottishtartans.org/kiltpage.html

However, I think a solid vest to break up the tartan between the tie and the kilt would look very nice, and might appease some who normally object to the tartan tie as "too much tartan."

As to ties with other patterns, such as stripes, etc., regimental ties (and I believe also some school ties) are striped, and I've always thought these have looked just fine worn with kilts. I don't have any photos handy, but if you search the web I'm sure you'll find some.

I think a patterned tie can look great with a kilt -- the trick is to find a pattern that looks good with the tartan. For one of the Burns Suppers I attended last year, I wore a green tie with a "medieval manuscript" type print on it with my Carolina tartan kilt, black Argyle and vest.


I know you can't see much of the tie in the image, because of the vest, but that's perfectly fine. I didn't want the tie to overwhelm, just to add a spash of color at the neck. I think it worked out well.

I know the subject here is neck ties, not bow ties, but since the gentleman I'm shown with in the above picture is wearing a tartan bow tie, I will chime in and say that I think a solid colored bow tie looks much better worn with formal Highland attire than does one from tartan.