Trading Castles

[M. A. C. Newsome]

Saw Trading Spaces on TLC last night, and they did a special "Trading Castles" episode in Scotland. Two castle owners agreed to trade homes for two days, redecorate each other's rooms, yadda yadda -- you know the story.

Anyway, since they were in Scotland, they pulled out the kilts. Some good, some bad.

The first kilt we saw was on Frank. Those familiar with the show know that Frank is a little ball of a man, and I guess he wanted to hide his shape a bit, but he didn't have his shirt tucked in. So he walks in with a long black shirt on, and underneath of it was peeking out a Royal Stewart kilt. From the size of the sett and the swing of the pleats, it looked like one of your less expensive casual kilts.

Anyway, he walked into the room, and people oohed and ahhed and the man he was working with checked to see if he was wearing it "properly" -- and poked a little fun at him for wearing spandex underneath.

So, not off to a great start, but after that, they got right to work on the room, and to Frank's credit, he kept the kilt on the entire weekend while stripping the walls, painting, and doing all the other dirty work they do on the show.

The next kilt we saw was on Faber, the carpenter. He was wearing a traditional Douglas kilt, and he was simply wearing it. They didn't make a fuss about Faber being kilted, he just had it on and was doing his work. I loved it. He looked good in it -- he was wearing his carpenter's apron and work boots, and just hung out in his kilt while working the whole time.

So, I was impressed with most of the show. It just showed them going about their business of re-doing the rooms in their kilts, without making more fuss or gags about it.

But then at the end, when they do the "reveal" they decided to dress fancy. :-( Things took a turn for the worse. Frank was still wearing his cheap-looking Royal Stewart kilt, with some aweful looking white boots, a formal pleated shirt -- still untucked -- with a formal sporran worn hanging down over his untucked shirt. It looked aweful! He was wearing a Prince Charlie jacket that looked like it was made of some kind of velveteen material. The overall impression was something you got from a costume shop, not a kilt makers.

Faber was not involved in the reveal, but the young Scottish man Frank had been working with was now kilted. The tartan he was wearing was too dark for me to make out the sett on television, but he was only slighttly better dressed than Frank. He had his shirt tucked in, at least, and was wearing a belt, with a hair sporran, another PC jacket that looked almost velveteen, and a huge floppy red velvet hat. (I should say he was wearing that had the entire episode, so maybe that's just his thing). Anyway, it looked more like an outfit from Brigadoon, so I'm thinking the costume department had something to do with it.

So, a mized review, but overall I think the fact that it showed men working in their kilts for nearly the full hour without much comment was a positive.

Aye,
Matt

[GMan]

At first I thought Matt was wanting to trade houses with one of us for awhile. But alas I was wrong.

When I read tales like this it sometimes makes me wish that I had not given up watching television. Their seems to be a large amount of things on regarding kilts.

[M. A. C. Newsome]

Trust me, Glen, if you have given up on the TV, don't go back. You are better off than the rest of us.
M