Ghillie brogues - why the dislike and resentment..?

[OC Richard]

Most Ghillies that are available in the US are rather chunky and inelegant...with their connection to pipe bands and hire, chunky soles and cheap construction are quite common.

So true!!

The modern mass-produced Ghillies that are sold by the thousands to Pipe Band people the world over generally have the cemented-on thick rubber soles.

The idea is that these "marching sole" Ghillies are more comfortable. Thousands of Pipe Band people would disagree.

BTW there's a regular occurrence at Highland Games which have big Pipe Band contests: invariably a band member will have the sole of one of his Ghillies just fall off. (That's what Duct Tape is for, right??)

Things were different in the mid-1970s when I joined my first band and bought my first pair of Ghillies. Mind you, only one person in the band owned Ghillies at the time I joined, a "mature gent", a piper who had served in the Cameron Highlanders in the Western Desert in WWII, who did loads of solo gigs and was a sharp dresser.

But the Pipe Major decided we should all get Ghillies, and I bought a pair at the next Highland Games.

The firm was Keltic. They had two styles of Ghillies to choose from: a heavy brogue with thick leather sole, and a lightweight shoe of supple leather. I picked the latter, and wore this pair for nearly 30 years. They were the most comfortable shoes of any sort I've ever worn (including trainers). I think I had them re-soled 4 times.

This was before Ghillies with cemented rubber soles had made their awkward debut.

Ghillie brogues are also inexorably linked to the kilt...

That's the very thing I like about Ghillies, they're a specific unique Highland Dress shoe.

...they cannot be worn with other clothes without appearing eccentric.

There were long stretches when Ghillies were the only black dress shoes I owned, and I often wore them with trousers. People rarely noticed. (Trousers are expected when performing on the Uilleann Pipes.)

I think the association with bands and hire has damaged their reputation in general but that doesn’t mean they cannot or should not have a place in the discussion of traditional civilian highland dress.

That's the thing, when I started kiltwearing Pipe Bands were just beginning to wear them. That 1970s Pipe Band, my first band, only started to get Ghillies in the late 1970s and would be the only band at Games wearing them, the other bands wearing either spats with military-style Full Dress, or buckled shoes with tartan hose and Evening Dress.

Also the nascent Kilt Hire Industry was yet to have it deleterious impact on traditional Highland Dress.

We all are a product of our age, and for my first decade of kiltwearing Ghillies had yet to acquire the dual stink of Kilt Hire and Pipe Bands. I'm simply unable to view Ghillies through the lens of someone who started kiltwearing when Ghillies were on the feet of every mannequin in every Kilt Hire shop window and being worn by every Pipe Band on the planet.