Please explain...

[JakobT]

I've agreed all along that a kilt doesn't have to be cut from tartan. And if you'll look at the definition, you'll see that it says the kilt is part of men's highland attire, so obviously a woman's skirt could never be a kilt by definition or design. It might look kind of like a kilt, but by no stretch of the imagination could it be considered part of a man's highland attire.

Setting aside velcro, lift the dot fasteners, and all the rest of the gubbins associated with the "contemporary" wrap around garment, it would seem that there are two, possibly three significant differences. (1) the traditional kilt has a lack of pockets. (2) the traditonal kilt is thickly pleated at the back. (3) the traditional kilt is a tailored garment. By tailored I mean shaped, not cut like a pleated sack that wraps around the waist.

I think we can all agree that traditional kilts don't have cargo pockets, or any pockets at all. I will admit that possibly a very few kilts have been made in the past with concealed pockets (usually in the waistband) but by and large on a kilt, pockets there ain't.

Now it's possible to split hairs over what "thickly pleated" means, but I think it is pretty much self-evident that "contemporaries" aren't exactly "thickly pleated", and many have pleats that continue "beyond the back" of the garment giving it a "ladies tennis skirt" look.

But what you're doing here is defining whether a garment is a kilt or not based on how traditional it is. My point is that I don't really think you can do that, I think you have to look for the unique characteristics of the garment. I agree completely about the pleats as a defining characteristic, but "thickly pleated" is very much open to interpretation, as it depends on the amount of material used, which is, as we've seen, anything from 4 yards and up. My own contemporary kilt is a 6-yarder with 28 2-inch pleats, so I'm not sure how self-evident it is that contemporary kilts are not "thickly pleated" either. I do think the aprons are one of the defining characteristics of the kilt, especially taken in conjunction with the pleats. As for pockets, I'm not sure whether they matter in this connection at all, since most of the pockets I've seen are simply sewn and/or riveted on the outside of the kilt, and don't really make any difference to the construction of the garment as such.

It's the same way with trousers, you can have them with or without pockets, the style and number of pockets may vary, the legs may be long or short, wide or narrow, straight or bell bottomed, and the material can be anything you like, but they're trousers just the same, because they have two legs. That's the defining characteristic of trousers.

However, I think much of the disagreement here stems from the fact that the kilt is both a general type of garment and a very specific piece of formal wear, and that these things over time have become more or less synonymous. Now I quite agree that strict rules should apply to formal wear, that's what "formal" means, after all. But that doesn't mean that casual or non-traditional kilts aren't kilts, they just aren't acceptable as formal wear. In the same way, an off-the-peg suit jacket is certainly no replacement for a tuxedo jacket for formal wear, but it's a jacket none the less.