IN-formal Evening Attire Question

[artificer]

Most certainly.. but only a light or med/russet brown during the day and ox blood/cordovan for after 6pm, lest one wishes to chance being denied entry until a more appropriate brown colour casual evening shoe is donned.. ;)

...I try not to be the only person in a jacket or the only person NOT in a jacket. Since it is easier to take one off than to produce one from one's sporran, I'd vote to take one if there is any question.

I had written an erudite and amusing ( not to mention lengthy) disquisition which I have just retracted, since not a word of it mentioned the original topic. I believe the traditional daywear color for shoes is black, even if you wear a brown belt and sporran. The exception would be true countrywear brown shoes or boots, which might be a touch casual for jackets, but probably fine for sweaters.

I always strive for the same as well, which in most circles in America today means "I'm wearing dockers and a short sleeve broadcloth shirt, I MUST be dressed"
I'm proud to say that I don't own a pair of dockers.
I'd like to see your disquisition, should you care to retype it.

In all honesty most Scots would not wear the kilt to those sorts of occasions, jeans and some sort of shirt(not a T shirt) seem to do these days. However, for the sort of event you are talking about, brown leathers will be fine.

It's kind of sad that the Kilt is considered a "special occasion" garment (or worse, an American TOURIST garment) for most in Scotland today.
Thanks, I was assuming that brown sporran /straps would be okay, but wanted to bounce it off the experts.

Where are you getting the notion that black leather = formal? Many kilt belts worn during the day are black and black full brogues are the go-to for daytime footwear. Even black leather sporrans are worn during the day, since it's really the style of the sporran, rather than its color, that determines its level of formality.

My thought is that about the only part of formal THCD that would necessarily be black leather during an evening formal event is a dirk belt, if a waistcoat isn't worn or a dirk is. Sporrans would be either fur, hair, or mask, a metal sporran chain (or perhaps a black or white patent leather strap) would be used in place of a leather strap, and shoes would be highly-shined black or patent leather buckle brogues or slippers.

My guess is that if the occasion is not formal, then most Scots would probably wear the same sporran/belt/shoes combination they wore durng the day. (Which would probably be a misture of brown and black, anyway...)

I wasn't assuming that black = formal so much as brown /= formal (with the implication that evenings are generally more formal than day events). I'm well aware that many casual bags are in black, but it's rare that you'd see a BROWN sporran at an evening event. THAT, to me anyway, raises the issue of the brown belt/sporran/strap in the evening (casual or otherwise).

The rest of the tiers of formality I'm pretty familiar with, there are plenty of threads dealing with day wear and evening wear. My original question was dealing with the particular situation I hadn't seen discussed on the board yet- the 'casual' evening, or "wearing brown into the night"

edit: BTW- Isn't white patent leather limited exclusively to Military dress (or royal dress, since they usually have military titles as well)?

Thanks all for your thoughts and help on the matter