Pipe Band dress predictions for the next decade

[OC Richard]

I've just been looking over some old Pathe videos of Highland Games in the 1950s and 1960s and I'm struck by how the dress of the competing Pipe Bands and Highland Dancers has utterly changed from then to today, while the dress of the Chiefs, Stewards, judges, and others in Highland Dress has remained the same.

The civilian Pipe Bands in the 50s and 60s were dressed the same as in Victorian times, either in military-style Full Dress or in a civilian Evening Dress with lace jabots, Regulation or Montrose doublets, tartan hose, buckled shoes, and long horsehair sporrans.

While watching video of the bands at a 1969 Highland Games the question arose "who in the Pipe Band world, in 1969, would have imagined that a decade in the future Pipe Band dress would completely change?" For by 1979 the feather bonnets, military doublets, Regulation doublets, long hair sporrans, spats, buckled shoes, and the rest would be gone, replaced by Prince Charlie or Argyll jackets, small Day or Evening sporrans, selfcoloured hose, and ghillie brogues.

Here we stand at the start of a new decade. How will Pipe Band dress look in 2030?

I think that bands like Inveraray are pointing the way towards an abandonment of the black & white look that's ruled the Pipe Band world since the 1980s, and moving toward earth-toned outfits with Weathered tartans and brown tweeds.

I predict that by 2030 the top bands will be wearing something along these lines:







Below we have earth-toned accessories worn with an ordinary Modern Colours kilt, which is a thing that will happen if Pipe Bands move in the direction I predict. This is because a band set of kilts is an extremely expensive thing, and bands change tartans far less often than they change accessories.

However the top bands, Grade One and sometimes Grade Two, have the resources to change their kilts more often.