Flashes

[OC Richard]

For sure there's a different visual dynamic with tartan hose v self-coloured hose.

With Highland Dress you have a certain number of places where you have an opportunity to set up nice colour-pair juxtapositions:

kilt v jacket/waistcoat
kilt v hose
hose v flashes
necktie v shirt

and with tartan hose a couple of those places disappear, pretty much.

Now the kilt and hose are the same.

Also with tartan hose you don't get the nice juxtaposition of flashes upon self-coloured hose, say red flashes on green hose, blue flashes on claret hose or what have you. If the hose are red and green tartan, either colour of flashes will get lost in the visual mix.

As Jock says don't worry about it. I'd wear any ordinary colour, for example I could equally wear red, green, or blue flashes with my Drummond Of Perth Muted hose:



This photo also shows the traditional Army scarlet flashes which they wear with any hose they wear: tartan, diced, self-coloured Lovat, khaki, or beige.

Of course every rule-of-thumb in the Army seems to have one glaring exception, and with flashes here it is:



Which goes to show that with tartan hose you could pick some colour which isn't present in the tartan and make the flashes really show. I wouldn't go that way myself.

As an aside, yesterday at a Highland Games two of the Drum Majors were wearing pink flashes (cancer awareness).