Proabably stepping in it....but...

[Kilted Stuart]

My wife wears a Canadian Casual Kilts hip hugger mini. We all know it's not a kilt and never said it was. Most ladies ask Machummel if they can get a ladies kilt skirt. Kilt refers to the material, apron and pleats but the skirt is what it really is. A Catholic school girls uniform is called a kilt. I'ts a skirt, we know that, it doesn't even look the same.
I'm not partial to a woman in a full kilt myself. It the only masculine garment I know that men can ware exclusively.

[Southern Breeze]

Women in mens kilts.I'm not touching that one.One of my relatives is a paramedic/instructer.He says the look on a new EMTs face when they start cutting off clothes and find out that HE is a SHE or vice-versa is priceless.That first encounter really gets them.

[bubba]

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but from what reference materials and highland dress I've seen, a kilt has two buckles on the right and one on the left, but a tartan skirt had two on the left and one one the right, similar to how men's shirts and pants are buttoned opposite women's blouses and pants.
.

A kilted skirt is the reverse of a kilt. The apron is right over left and the pleats run in the opposite direction. The pleats are also shallower and there are fewer of them.

[KiltedCodeWarrior]

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Ione. You deserve a hug, but my arms won't reach that far! (Wherever you are!!).

Ione, you have truly made yourself a member of the forum, and with only 2 posts (although good timing did not hurt) by being welcomed by Ham AND offered a hug! I never got a hug (sniff, sniff) and I have been here for ages (well at least 2 weeks!).

Later,
RJI

[KiltedCodeWarrior]

There's more about "Mr. September" in the September UK newsletter. They explain that she plays a straight man on stage and the UK is part of her "drag" outfit in her stage role as a straight man.

Seems fair to me.

Ron

Ron, I have to say that I think this makes it worse, as it essentially makes the UK a cross-dressing garment, right? A woman wearing it to look like or portray a man? Isn't that one of the stereotypes/perceptions we are trying to prevent by pointing out that the kilt is a man's garment?

Food for thought.

[Iolaus]

Ron, I have to say that I think this makes it worse, as it essentially makes the UK a cross-dressing garment, right? A woman wearing it to look like or portray a man? Isn't that one of the stereotypes/perceptions we are trying to prevent by pointing out that the kilt is a man's garment?

Food for thought.

My wife just looked at that picture and said "She's a girl impersonating a man? and she's wearing a kilt? Isn't that a cheat? I mean a kilt says "man" but to her it's just another skirt."

[KiltedCodeWarrior]

My wife just looked at that picture and said "She's a girl impersonating a man? and she's wearing a kilt? Isn't that a cheat? I mean a kilt says "man" but to her it's just another skirt."

Although to be honest, based on the picture I would never have mistaken her for a him or him for a her, or she wearing a kilt, or him wearing a ... ummmh, whaqt and which way was I supposed to be arguing?

[Iolaus]

Although to be honest, based on the picture I would never have mistaken her for a him or him for a her, or she wearing a kilt, or him wearing a ... ummmh, whaqt and which way was I supposed to be arguing?

We're getting awfully close to "un-P.C." 8-)

[Rigged]

Part of the problem is that the wonderful people who make the Utilikilt will not take sides when it comes to defining what men are buying into when they buy a Utilikilt.

I think there are two fundamental reasons for this:

Steven and Megan have openly disagreed on the "kilts are for men" issue. Megan has stated in an interview published in one of their monthly newsletters that "Utilikilts are for everyone." While Steven maintained, in the same article that Utilikilts "...are made for men only."

So, there are competing agendas within the company.

Seattle (AKA Emerald City), Washington, where the UKs are made is one of the most liberal cities in America with one of the largest gay communities in the U.S. (having been there, Capital Hill seems larger in land area than San Francisco's Castro District). According to Wikipedia, Capital Hill is also where Grunge music got started.

The attitude of the Utilikilts company towards gender issues, I believe, reflects the very liberal, laid-back culture of Seattle.

I think they've chosen not to care how their image "plays in Peoria." (For you folks outside of the U.S. "How it plays in Peoria" is an allusion to movies and stage acts and how well or poorly they might be received in America's conservative, rural heartland as represented by Peoria, Illinois.)

As long as they're selling lots of kilts, they don't need to care.

The question is whether they will loose sales in the long run as more kilt companies make similar products and have a clear pro-male message and image to go with their products.

As someone else pointed out, we'll not likely see a campy-looking transvestite male advertising dresses in a woman's clothing catalog. Well, maybe RuPaul could get away with it.

Still, I think most women would find that insulting.

[Shay]

A woman in drag is no more dressing like a woman than a man in drag is dressing like a man. The key is 'dressing like' not 'being'.

I only know a couple drag kings, but they all respect men's clothes as such and find enjoyment (of whatever kind) in dressing as the other gender.

I'm just saying- if you would be upset as a woman with drag queens wearing women's clothing, then the same problems would occur with you as a man with women wearing traditional men's clothing, however, it is crossdressing in the absolute sense.

Rigged said:

As someone else pointed out, we'll not likely see a campy-looking transvestite male advertising dresses in a woman's clothing catalog. Well, maybe RuPaul could get away with it.

No offense, but kilts are sadly still a specialty item sold to those people who don't care what others think to an extent... several designers and marketers (MAC among them, who have had RuPaul as a model) have used transgender models in their campaigns. Sadly it's to show their 'edginess' more than the practical and usual use of their product, which is what I suspect UK is doing in this case.

(Gah- I'm the queen of quotation marks tonight... and there's no crosstyping involved...)