Your Best Guess?

[John_Carrick]

I divide my time between Northern Ireland (70%) and the Republic of Ireland (30%).

About 800,000 of Northern Ireland's population of 1.7 million would have some level of Ulster Scots genealogy. Pipe bands are big here and a fair proportion hire kilts for weddings or big dos/Burns Night. The Ulster Scots Agency promotes cultural events where kilts will appear. You will see very few kilts otherwise and my wild guess would be that less than 1% would be kilt owners, which would be around 8000 people if correct. There are two kilt suppliers in Belfast and they seem to do a good trade, so maybe there are more.

I would guess the proportion of kilt owners/wearers in the Republic would be close to nil statistically, perhaps 1000 in 4.7 million or 0.02%. Complete guess of course but it is really low. There are loads of pipe bands, highland dress is not uncommon for weddings and the like. Kilts for Irish dancing were once compulsory for boys, but now virtually unknown. Kilts are seen as Scottish clothing, although they have featured in Irish culture.