Are kilts getting longer?

[Kiltman]

I would first have to ask if they had ever worn the kilt before. Many people regardless of geography rent kilts and prince charlies for their wedding, many times this can result in either an ill fitting kilt or perhaps a groom and groomsmen that do not realize how the kilt should be worn.

Many Scots have never worn kilts. Too bad. I'm always happy to see someone wearing a kilt and about two or three times a year have to gently help them to wear them properly.
On a happier note I received an email from a dean at my college asking me to help him to learn to wear a kilt properly for his wedding. I, of course, was delighted, but warned that kilts shrink when they are not worn.

[Jaggy thistle]

There is nothing worse than seeing someone in a kilt that is too long top of the knee or higher hose well below the knee even my own family have erred on the long side

[ForresterModern]

Well, I'm not going to criticize the placement of his sporran.

.

or question the value of its length.

[okiwen]

or question the value of its length.

We'd all like to say that it was probably needed this long if we could get away with it.

I found this funny.

I sent that photo to my wife. she thought it was great.

[Cavebear58]

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[Lachlan09]

I didn't realise there was a young and an old way of wearing it, just good or bad, wearer or wedding dummy.

Well in that case, I still prefer the "old" way if that’s what it’s called, with kilt to mid-kneecap, so that it doesn't quite touch the floor if you get on your knees and coming up to just a little below the bottom of the ribs, bottom of buckle over the navel. Hose worn to show a little bit of shin, not worn up to the knee like a pair of football (soccer to USA's) socks.

Maybe showing a slit of knee between knee and top of hose is all the fashion today but to me it looks sloppy and untidy. Perhaps it’s another example of today’s sloppy looks with scrunched “just out of bed” hair, shirts hanging outside of trousers, open sleeve-cuffs dangling, not to mention the baseball cap/teeshirt/surf-shorts culture which has infected most of the world.

It's all about dressing right with pride and confidence in your appearance, just like looking good in a suit or even when casually dressed.

[Lachlan09]

In fact - just like in your photo above is good. Hose coming to that little protruding bone below the knee.

I think that photo's round about 1968-70. I recognise the Gordons' Drum Major. Amongst everything else like the Tattoo, he also appeared in the 92nd’s pipe band scene in the film “Waterloo”.

He was one of the recognisable army characters of that time such as, WOII Malloch – D/Major of the Argylls, Piper Sandy Mackintosh of the Argylls (with his full beard), Pipe Major George Stoddart (Gavin’s dad) of the Scots Guards and Pipe Major Dennis Rodden of the KOSB’s.

[Lachlan09]

Wow ! I’ve just seen that photo of the RRS officers mess-dress uniform !

The model sticks out like a sore thumb. In no way, shape or form is he an officer in the RRS or even the British Army. He’s standing there like a prize prune and has no clue of how to stand while wearing a kilt.

However the uniform is real. I also have one of the sporrans and indeed they are longer than the regimental ones previously used by the kilted regiments before 2006. They are now more Victorian in length.

I also have the original goat-hair version which was issued then withdrawn, which looks wavy and exceedingly cute but it just isn’t “British Army” style.

Have you seen that photo of an RRS sentry at Edinburgh Castle wearing the goat-hair sporran ? I think Wikipedia uses that pic for their item on RRS. I cringed when I saw the soldier, glengarry too big, kilt too low and tilted, sporran looking like Santa Clause’s beard.

[Lachlan09]

The two WW1 kilties in an earlier pic in this thread look to be Kitchener volunteers to me, probably in the very late 1914/early 1915 timescale. Clearly they are Argylls and both wear spats as the early part of the war. However, they both wear standard pre-utility British army tunics, having regular square bottom edges in lieu of the curved bottom edge of pre-war issue khaki kilt tunics. Both tunics have the pleated pockets and shoulder patches however, rather than the plain wartime utility tunic seen from 1915 onward. One of the Argylls has no badge in his Glengarry.

That would most certainly make it either a wartime service battalion or expanded TF battalion, who had less “dibs” on uniform issue during the big initial rush to uniform the large influx of volunteers and had to piece together their uniforms as stocks became available.

[Lachlan09]

The colour photo at Edinburgh Castle, what regiments ? To me it looks like the PM of the Black Watch, PM of the Gordons, DM of the Gordons, PM of the Royal Scots, PM of the Argylls, PM of the QOH.