What makes a skirt masculine?

[Charlie]

I do like your bag, Christopher, and I'm tempted to get one as well. I get tired of men having all the drab while the girls get all the flighty, fancy stuff.

Your bag and the attitude behind it reminds me of some years ago, when I had to get from the car park into work in the rain. The only shelter available was my daughter's pink mickey mouse umbrella, which I used. The guy with me would not walk with me, preferring to get wet rather than be seen under such a silly thing. Doing the outrageous is great fun

Charlie

[ChristopherJ]

I get tired of men having all the drab while the girls get all the flighty, fancy stuff.

Me too Charlie. Although I don't go for 'flighty' or 'fancy', but I do try hard to avoid the traditional male drab and go for either bright colours or at least a strong design of some kind.

I don't want to look like everyone else. There will be plenty of time to look like each other when we are all dead. While we are alive, I like to celebrate our individuality as much as I can.

Get a Gromit bag Charlie! You know it makes sense . . .

[BrotherTailor]

I've really been pondering (getting back to masculinity in skirts here) ways that a man can present himself as dignified, gentlemanly, relaxed, and comfortable in a skirt. I seem to have come down to a few general "principles" that I'm going to experiment with at the sewing machine this winter.

I think the skirt needs to be somewhere around the knee, like a kilt. It should somehow be pleated and fairly full (A-line), it should be belted. It should be a neutral solid, tartan/plaid, or a grey brown tweed.

On top. Whatever we wear on top for formal wear should expose the belt...like a traditional vest, or a cutaway jacket along the lines of a traditional kilt jacket. I would stay away from a tailcoat though - tails over a skirt seems strange. For casual wear, just a nice matching/contrasting shirt, or a shirt and sweater either sleeveless or sleeved depending on weather and tastes. Normal male necklines.

Footwear, depends on weather obviously...although sensible leather walking shoes do me year round for casual wear. shoes must match the belt and both must not clash with the skirt/top combo. I'm not a fan of boots other than for work, save them for the utilikilt look. However, genuine green rubber Gates "Wellies" (from Scotland)go famously with a tweed skirt.... out walking the dog or working around the yard, mucking out the stables.

A tweed or plaid flat cap might go well, or even some other brimmed hat. I'd stay away from ball caps. Or go bare headed. Carry a walking stick if you wish.

Anyhow, this is where I'm at in my mind's eye. I spent hours poring over pictures and then scanning ebay and the web for "looks" that yelled 'Country gentleman" and I wound up mainly looking at ladies' skirt suits of the softer tweed variety. "Quiet Man Lite" look. We can go for a hulky gladiator braveheart look, or a more refined gentleman farmer tweedy look. My physique tends more to the wimpy gentleman look.... So that is going to be my focus for the next while as I experiment. I'll wear my own design "Workilt" for work and shock the ladies!

[sapphire]

I think the man makes the skirt masculine; the way he carries himself, confidence, standing up straight.

Bright colors are OK. You can certainly find bright purple dress shirts for example. Men don't look less manly in Hawaiian shirts.

[BrotherTailor]

Of course bright colours are fine if your complexion and hair etc are suitable. I have shopped for men's suits and other stuff all my life and every clerk I have asked for advice has pointed me to the camels, sandy browns, taupe/green, and blacky greys or tweeds. They say "it's your colour". I come off badly in bright colours. The other day I wore black pleated docker type trousers, with a subdued reddish purple cotton shirt with a brown belt and brown shoes, and it worked well. A hard red would have been terrible. I need muting....

I was just putting forth ideas that I have come to with regards to myself. Not meant to imply that everyone else must do likewise. I could never bring myself to wear a Hawaiian shirt as I find it distasteful to the eye, but it does suit some men...I have a friend from Trinidad, and it suits him well and his personality.

I'm a tweed personality.

[sapphire]

Tweed is good.

You bring up a good point about complexions and colors. Back in the 80s there was a fashion trend called "Color Me Beautiful" which aimed to match a person with the colors that worked best on her. They grouped colors into seasons.

I turned out to be a "Winter". Certain bright colors work well on me. In today's fashion parlance those are called jewel tones.

From what you describe, you seem to be an "Autumn"

[Sinned]

I'll try and resurrect an old thread again. I have been more engrossed in the skirt as an object of clothing in its own right and not put very much thought into its integration into the whole look. Yes, if I'm wearing a yellow skirt then I would wear a complementary top and tights but I wanted to go beyond that into the more formal area. So this evening while I am on my own I've spent a couple of hours trying various skirts with various shirts, t-shirts, pullovers and found some interesting combinations. I found one that really threw me as I thought it so unlikely. I combined a black shirt with a dark grey suit type jacket and dark tights. The surprising skirt - a cotton WHITE broad box pleated number falling to just below mid thigh and a few inches longer than the jacket. My wife gave me two of these skirts. With the right shoes it would be great as an evening outfit. Does it look masculine? On its own on the hanger - possibly not. But as part of a whole outfit then I would say yes. But then I would wouldn't I?

Sinned

[jeanfor]

I have a number of kilts, casual, more formal. Some have the right apron covers the left. For the purist it is a woman's kilt, but since they fit me well and still look masculine, I reallty dont make any fuss about it. What makes it masculine is the way you wear it. Also, our goal is to push forward the idea that skirts are fine for men, not to push for a specific type of skirt!

[janrok]

What makes a skirt masculine?
Is this a riddle?
The answer should of course be: The guy who is in it!

[RichardA]

What makes a skirt masculine?
Is this a riddle?
The answer should of course be: The guy who is in it!

You beat me too it...

[Hemitom]

Well lets ask this question...What makes a skirt Feminine besides the flowers or other crap attached to it???

[Caultron]

It seems to me that a skirt (or any other garment) is masculine or feminine based on social conventions. So, for example, the following features, which primarily appear only in men's clothes, would increase the perceived masculinity of a skirt:

Heavier fabrics
Muted colors
Pockets
Belt loops
Wide belts

The opposites, of course, would suggest femininity:

Thinner fabrics
Bright colors or prints
No pockets, or useless ones
Plain waist
Thin belts, if any

I'm not so sure about zipper location and length. I have one skirt with a zipper up front and it's so short and so high up that it's useless for any masculine purpose. And even if the ziper were longer, I'd still probably just lift my hem. It's easier.

Shorts skirtrs are probably tougher for a man to sit in than for women, especially if you're going to go commando or regimental or whatever. Also, men's above-the-knee shorts seem out of mainstream fashion these days. But it's hard to say how much those should count.

And of course, the rest of one's outfit also plays a factor.

It's interesting that by this definition, haute couture men's skirts generally aren't very masculine. I guess putting a football jersey and a pocketed denim skirt on the runway just isn't the haute couture way. And you don't see many women's everyday clothes on the runway either.

But in the end it all comes down to what you like, and masculinity or feminity may have nothing to do with that. Women routinely wear clothes with men's features and, "get away with it."

[STEVIE]

"CLOTHING DOES NOT HAVE GENDER"
The person wearing said clothing has exclusive rights on that one.
Steve.

[Caultron]

I agree, no piece of clothing has a gender of its own. It's just an inanimate scrap of material.

Wearing clothes, however, somewhat obscures our genders, and so we develop other cues to communicate that information. Gender-specific clothing and features are among those cues. So if you make up a list of cues considered male and female, you can advertize your gender by choosing features from one list or the other.

In Western culture, skirts generally fall in the feminine list. If you don't care about that, fine. But if you want to decrease the skirt's feminine connotation, one approach is choosing skirts that incorporate cues from the masculine list.

Sorry if all this is a bit egg-headed. It's kinda got me in sociologist/psychologist mode (not that I'm any sort of expert in either).

[RichardA]

A bra is feminine