Kilt Me!

Alexander McQueen and Buying Me Presents

If someone wants to buy this jacket for me, just shoot me an e-mail.  It's only $4,435 at Neiman Marcus. But it would look so good with...well, all of my kilts.

Summer Shoes

I'm liking this look.  I think with a blue denim kilt and a light weight button down shirt this could work for me.  What do you think?

They're Sperry Top Siders.

 

Ok, these are cool too.  Diane pointed me to Espadrille's which look good, and are $18. 

Summer and Kilts: The age old question

So, it's hot out again, and I'm forced to figure out what the hell to wear on my feet.  I have a number of lightweight kilts that I like to wear, but solid boots and kilt hose get pretty hot pretty quickly.  So what do I do?  Does it really make sense to look at what guys wear with shorts and just do that?

It looks fine with shorts, but sometimes a little wimpy with a kilt.  I can wear little shoes like this with low socks, but that can look awkward as well.  I love my Paladiums and they're a good middle ground, but on a really hot day they're still just hot.

What do you all do?  Just deal with being hot?  Wear flip-flops and hold you chin up?

Kilts: high rise or low?

I've been thinking a lot recently about what I like and don't like about most of the kilts I own. The one thing that keeps coming up is where they sit on my waist.  I like my traditional kilt and how it straps tightly around my mid section, but I generally wear it with very specific sweaters or a traditional Argyl jacket. 

For the last eight years or so, almost every pair of pants I've bought has been low-rise.  From my jeans to my slacks, they all sit on my hips and that's just how it is.  I've gotten used to it.  What I think less about is what that means for everything else I own. Most of my jackets, sweaters, and shirts have picked out to go with low-rise pants.  They fall in the right places, are just long enough to tuck in or not, and hopefully show off my torso in a slightly flattering way.

So, why do all my kilts fit around my waist?  At the end of the day, it just makes them even harder to fit with everything else in my wardrobe.  Even my Utilikilts ride high, and if I wear them lower they're so long they start to look silly.  

So what do I want?  I want a kilt that sits low on my hips like every pair of pants I own.  I want it to be the right length so it hits just in the center (or slightly below) my knee, and I want it to be comfortable. What do you think?

Not a Kilt, but it Should Be

After looking at the skirts from H&M and the kilt/pants from Pringle I got to thinking about what type of details I would want to see in a kilt.  I took a walk during my lunch break to the Diesel and G-Star stores on Union  Square.

G-Star has a pair of jeans that I liked quite a bit.  The reinforced parts give them a bit of weight and the details are great.  I like the contrasting stitching and I like the angles as well as the pockets.  Most importantly I think they offer some inspiration what a great kilt could look like.  Heavy denim, well washed, strong lines and tacks that give it a rugged look without being completely over the top. They also appear to take into account the actual shape of the human body which I think is always a good place to start.

(I should note that I couldn't find these on their site otherwise I'd link to them.  The site was a bit irritating to navigate.)

Pringle of Scotland or "What's with kilts and pants?"

I've started to see more and more photos of men with kilts and pants on.  I found it a bit odd ten years ago when girls started wearing jeans under their skirts, but it grew on me.  This look isn't especially growing on me as much as it's making me wonder if male models just have terrible legs. 

Here's a shot from the Pringle of Scotland Fall2010 collection for men. And there it is.  The kilt and the pants.  I'm not exactly sure what it is that bothers me, but it's doesn't sit right.  It may be that there's no contrast in color between the two garments and so they blend together.  One of the things I like about kilts is that the bottom edge of the kilt offers great contrast that is striking and unique.  This looses that completely. 

At the end of the day it makes what might be a lovely kilt, look like a slightly frumpy apron.

(Click the photo to see more on AmmoMag.com)

H&M Selling Skirts for Men--Epic Fail

Happy New Years and warm wishes to you all.  I've been a little out of the kilt world for the last few months, but I'm back in the saddle and looking forward to what the year has to offer. 

A few people sent me articles about H&M's decision to sell skirts for men.  I was a little excited, but had fairly low expectation which, for better or worse, I think were well met.  There just doesn't seem to be anything especially masculine about this, and I think that's a major fail on their part.  It also doesn't look like anything most of us could (or let's face it, want to) fit into our current wardrobes. It's soft, bland, and uninspiring.  It has no texture, no great fittings, and just looks flat.  I don't expect they'll be flying off the shelf.

All of these attempts may force me to just start designing my own kilts based on what I've liked and not liked about what's currently out there.  H&M's effort gives man-skirts a bad name, and it really didn't need any more help with negative PR.

Men's Jackets to go with Kilts

Jackets are often a little bit difficult for me when it comes to wearing kilts.  Often the length is too long or too short, the weight isn't right, or the cut just seems out of place.  Most of the time it's the length though.  I find that jackets work best when they're either waist length or come about half way down the thigh. Most sports coats are exactly the wrong length for a kilt, which is often very frustrating.  I have  had a few of them cut so they fit like a traditional Argyle jacket, but I have bunch more that just don't work.

One of the things I like about this jacket is the hardware.  Because kilts have a bit of weight to them I think some heavy hardware often fits well.  The closures on this jacket are a good example of how strong metal fixtures can work well. The jacket is from Ralph Lauren's Rugby collection. Click either photo for details.

 

Here's a close-up of the fixtures:

Sweaters and Kilts

I was talking with a friend over the weekend and about baggy sweaters versus form fitting.  It seems this fall that I'm seeing a lot of extremes in both directions: either very loose and baggy, or perfectly tight.  I've been wearing tighter sweaters this fall in general and I think it's a good look.  Here's a sweater by Zara that I think could look great with a kilt.  It works especially well with the tie and shirt as shown.

The Replays it is

I stopped by the shoe store on 23rd street yesterday (http://www.medicishoes.com/) and tried on the Replays I posted yesterday.  They were comfortable, fit great and look to be well made.  They offered me a bit of a discount, and I took them home.  My only concern is the zippers either breaking or not staying up.  I'll just have to wait and see.

So far I love them though.  Here's me today:

 

And here's a close up of the boots:

Kilts and x-mas sweater

Last night we had a small office x-mas party down at the Blind Tiger Ale house.  I received a lovely sweater, shirt, and tie which I wore into work today.  With a kilt, of course.  I'm wearing my old UK workman's which now only has four working snaps on it.  It's still one of my favorite kilts though, and when I dress it up with a tie I feel like I can get away with it.

Here's a shot from this morning:

Mailman in a Kilt

Personally I think this is a great idea.  I was watching our local UPS guy unload a truck yesterday and thought, "wow, he'd be much more comfortable in a brown UK workman."  When I arrived in the office this morning, I found this article in my inbox.  I think it would do wonders for the American Postal Service.

I know I'll get shit for this, but I think they'd look better with Sporrans.

Kilts
Originally uploaded by florent_leturmy

Steampunk Kilt

I've been rediscovering my love of steampunk, especially in the realm of fashion.  For those of you who know me, you may ask yourselves, "Since when has Ben had a love of steampunk?" or even "what the fuck is steampunk?"

I'll start with the second question first:  Steampunk magazine (which you can find at steampunkmagazine.com says,

First and foremost, steampunk is a non-luddite critique of technology. It rejects the ultra-hip dystopia of the cyberpunks with their black rain and nihilistic posturings; while simulatenaously forfeiting the conceit of the noble savage fantasy of the pre-technological era. It revels in the reality of technology, its very beingness as oppossed the over anlyitical abstractness of cybernetics. Steam technology is the difference between the nerd and the mad scientist. Steampunk machines are real, breathing, coughing, struggling and rumbling parts of the world. They are not the airy intellectual fairies of alogorythmic mathematics but the hulking manifestations of muscle and mind. The progedy of sweat, blood, tears and delusions. The technology of steampunk is natural, it moves, lives, ages and even dies.

Now that we have that out out of the way...

In some ways my newfound love has been more a process of pulling likes together from my past into an aesthetic that makes sense with where I am now.  In high school I wore bowlers and coat tails.  I loved Brazil and I collected antique lighters that were far too large to be useful.  I loved old bottles of liquor, anything made of brass, antique sewing machines, and anything with texture.

How does this all come together with my love of kilts?  That's a good question, and it's a question I intend to answer through the creative process.  My goal is to design a kilt that speaks to the steampunk aesthetic  and works specifically with my lifestyle,  meaning it works in ways that are useful to me. 

With the help of my good friend Joel, I've begun piecing together thoughts and images, fabrics and brass fittings, and a whole slew of day dreams.  I'll keep posting as the project moves along.

One of the first things I did was go to the fabric store and take pictures of anything that appealed to me.  Here's a small gallery of those shots.

If anyone has any thoughts, examples, or images they'd like to share I'd love to see them.  Leave a note in comments or send me an e-mail.

Down with Zippers! Up with Kilts!

A slogan we can all live by.  Or live with.  I made this shirt on Zazzle.com and promptly ordered one.  It just arrived the other day and I thought a rainy Friday was the perfect time to wear it.

If you'd like your own t-shirt just click on the image to the right or click here! The shirts are American Apparel, so they're high quality cotton tees that actually fit well compared to most online t-shirt printing places. 

'Men In Skirts' Victoria and Albert Museum

I've posted some pictures from this exhibit in the past, but there are many at this link that I haven't seen before.  It's a great exhibit and it includes some kilts I'd definitely wear out and about.  Like this one:

Also, another shot of the Vivienne Westwood kilt I posted about last week.

They have a "micro-site" through the museum that has many more photos if you're interested.  You can find it here.

It's a plaid kind of thing

Over at men.style.com they're catching on to the fact that plaid is in.  They've listed plaid as one of their top ten fall '08 style trends for the year. 

For the full slide show click on this link.

To read the article click here.

Kilt Shoes in the Summer?

I've been thinking about what to wear on my feet this summer when I go kilted, and I've been having  a tough time coming up with things that look good and are comfortable in the heat. 

On Saturday I was at a wedding where I met a young man who gave me some inspiration.  Here are two shots of him, including the all important "shoe shot".  I think this might work well with a kilt:

Frye Boots

Today is the first day that I did a search of my own blog.  I was trying to remember if I had posted about these boots before.  Since I didn't find anything, I'll post about them now! 

I've been thinking about footwear options and realizing that I mostly wear my black Frye boots.  This lead me to consider the possibility that I might like other boots by Frye.  The answer was a resounding yes.  These boots are high on my wish list of kilt accessories:

Nerdy Kilt Man!

I just found this guy on Flikr and I think he's awesome.  He totally makes this kilt his own.  The tie, the glasses, the shoes and the Utilikilt all just work well together to create something completely new. 

This is really one of the things I'm looking for.  If the kilt is no longer just a traditional Scottish thing, then how can we fit it into our lives?  It all comes back to what I've been saying all along.  Make the kilt work for you rather than the other way around. 

You can see the rest of his photos on Flikr.