What would you like to see in a man's dress?

[skirtguy22]

I'd prefer something similar to a tunic, which reaches to the knees. Possibly something similar to what the Romans wore and in modern fabrics like denim.

[JohnH]

I'd prefer something similar to a tunic, which reaches to the knees. Possibly something similar to what the Romans wore and in modern fabrics like denim.

I feel that if a skirt reaches down to only the knees, I have to wear underpants. I guess for the Romans it was not such a big thing if a skirt blew upwards and exposed the privates on occasion. That situation is intolerable in the United States. I was looking at something longer to keep from having to wear underpants.

[Big and Bashful]

I'd prefer something similar to a tunic, which reaches to the knees. Possibly something similar to what the Romans wore and in modern fabrics like denim.

I feel that if a skirt reaches down to only the knees, I have to wear underpants. I guess for the Romans it was not such a big thing if a skirt blew upwards and exposed the privates on occasion. That situation is intolerable in the United States. I was looking at something longer to keep from having to wear underpants.

Just to point out the obvious, the Scottish kilt is only knee length, most folk in kilts don't bother with underwear, too hot and sweaty under 8 tons of wool! However the apron does help with modesty as the inner part tends to fall and cover up when sitting.

[JohnH]

I'd prefer something similar to a tunic, which reaches to the knees. Possibly something similar to what the Romans wore and in modern fabrics like denim.

I feel that if a skirt reaches down to only the knees, I have to wear underpants. I guess for the Romans it was not such a big thing if a skirt blew upwards and exposed the privates on occasion. That situation is intolerable in the United States. I was looking at something longer to keep from having to wear underpants.

Just to point out the obvious, the Scottish kilt is only knee length, most folk in kilts don't bother with underwear, too hot and sweaty under 8 tons of wool! However the apron does help with modesty as the inner part tends to fall and cover up when sitting.

I guess the weight of all that wool would help keep the kilt down. I was talking about skirts of normal weight. Maybe in the United Kingdom it might not be such a big thing for a kilt or skirt to blow up with nothing underneath, but here in the United States one cannot take that risk.

[ethelthefrog]

We're not quite so laid back over here that wardrobe mishaps of that nature won't cause some consternation and possibly a word from the local people of the law suggesting that pants (underwear) would be a prudent addition to the outfit.

[AndrewH]

I wear dresses for two reasons.
One is that I like to do the full crossdressing bit - but that is not the purpose of this web site, so I will move on from there, except to say that the only dress I have which really fits me I had made to measure)!

The second is that I sometimes suffer from back spasms. When I do, cannot wear anything as tight as a trouser or skirt waistband; I can just about tolerate the fairly lose elastic of women's panties (which again I wear for comfort and fit -i.e. fashion freedom, not primarily to do with my crossdressing).

So I do have some knee length and some long dresses I wear around the house only in male mode. They tend to be loose fitting, like the original one in this post, though are more likely to have short sleeves for summer and longer ones for winter.

I understand the comments about the look of a man in a dress; a dress tends to be a more feminine garment that a skirt (or rather, you can get "unisex" style skirts but unisex style dresses are very rare). However, I plead necessity and comfort rather than looks and acceptability to the public as reasons for wearing a dress as a man.

[Olga]

I guess the weight of all that wool would help keep the kilt down. I was talking about skirts of normal weight. Maybe in the United Kingdom it might not be such a big thing for a kilt or skirt to blow up with nothing underneath, but here in the United States one cannot take that risk.

You may add some additional weight to your skirt by sewing a couple of heavy beads or coins on the inner side of your skirt (where the seams are).

[Since1982]

Olga, we have an Introductions Forum for new members to introduce themselves to the membership, tell us where you're from and what you like to do.

[JohnH]

And now, you are wondering what is happening as I lose weight.

Below is the original model - she looks a lot better than I can hope to look!

Ellos_Dress.jpg

Then the dress that I modeled when I weighed 208 lbs - notice I did not have any definition in my profile.

Johns_ellos_dress_208_lbs.jpg

The I dropped 10 lbs to 198 lbs. There is starting to be some definition in my figure.

johns_ellos_dress_198.jpg

My blood pressure at 208 lbs was about 145/85 and my resting heart pulse rate was around 85 bpm.

After I dropped to 198 lbs the blood pressure is about 129/77 and my resting heart pulse rate is about 65 bpm. So this dress may prove to be a lifesaver. I haven't told my wife that I am losing weight so I can look good in the dress!

When I lose another 10 lbs or so I will model the dress again.

[Stu]

The problem with a woman's dress is that it is often designed to accentuate the female figure by emphasising the narrowness of the waist, broadness of the hips and defining the shape of the breasts. They just don't work for men, IMO.

I'm not convinced that dresses will ever work for men. If any dresses are to look even acceptable on a man, they would either have to be something akin to robes, or else something that is a variant on a male garment, which would include shirt dresses or tee-shirt dresses. Even these would have to be very carefully designed so that they retained a masculine image, otherwise they would just look either like an ugly woman trying to look feminine, or like a bloke-in-a-frock crossdresser.

I must confess that I remain to be convinced that this is ever going to work. Let's be honest, we've had very limited success in getting men's skirts off the ground and they are still a very long way from being mainstream, so I think men's dresses are a non-starter at this time.

Stu

[Big and Bashful]

As mentioned elsewhere, for male dresses, there are robes, kaftan type thingies, historical stuff such as worn in Gladiator etc. Midas clothing do a line of dresses for men, they are too short for my tastes though, I like below the knee so that I don't have to think about what is on show.
I do like flowy swirly skirts, but they do look very 'feminine' unfortunately, pity because they feel so good. Also a pity my long flowy brown thing drowned in my little boating accident recently.

[JohnH]

My feeling is that we have got to get past the notion of clothes looking too feminine. It did not bother men in the 1700's to have feminine looking clothes back then. It was the French that during the French revolution that obliterated fancy men's styles and introduced plain clothes for men.
Before that unfortunate trend I would guess there were very few men being transvestites.

In my mind it is OK to wear skirts, dresses, blouses, makeup, pantyhose, high-heeled shoes, etc. as long as the man does not try to pass himself off as a woman. What I mean is the man should not use fake body parts (e.g., breast forms), speak like a woman, move like a woman, and take on a feminine name.

We have got to break out of the "plain clothes" paradigm. It will take some time for men to establish beautiful fashions that are masculine in context.

About the jersey Ellos dress that I modeled: I need to further reduce weight so my waist is better defined. It is encouraging that my waist is starting to get defined after losing 10 lbs. I need to get rid of the "love handles" and gut, and then I would look much better in the dress. That should come about after I lose 23 more lbs. I do admit that that dress would not work for most men since they are flat in the chest and have narrow hips, which is not the way I am built. What I would like to do is to design and make is a dress where the bodice is based on a shirt to accommodate the typical male figure. I would like to make it mid-calf length so that the risk of the skirt blowing up is not likely, and that way, one would not have to wear underpants.

[Since1982]

Stu said: My feeling is that we have got to get past the notion of clothes looking too feminine.

It's hard to get past the notion of dresses with large hollow bust areas and dress modeling specifically for the female form "not" looking feminine. I think to wear dresses or skirts that don't look feminine, we have to create the garments specifically for the male body shape. Like for instance Utilikilt or some of the goth male skirted garments created just for men. Those fashion designs Juan has shown us is a good idea, but too fancy to be taken seriously by the males that may possibly start trying skirts. Some nice manly skirted garments similar to garments of the past and sold at medium to low prices would, I believe, get skirted male garments in the mainstream supply.

[JohnH]

For all the liberal ideas that I mentioned that I think would be OK for a man - e.g., high heels, makeup, etc., in practice I make it my business to wear mostly men's clothing when I go out with a skirt. Today when I went to the store I wore a man's khaki short sleeve shirt and men's sandals with my gray skirt.

Skip, I agree that is would look ridiculous for a man to wear a woman's dress if he does not have the breasts to fill out the "large hollow bust areas". I barely fill out those areas in my dress without the use of breast forms.

I agree with you about the rather esoteric fashions that Juan showed us. That styling is not mainstream. Now, how about some skirt suits that can be worn in a business context with perhaps [shudder} a tie. After awhile I would replace the plain shirt and tie with a ruffled shirt that men used to wear.

[Since1982]

Skip, I agree that is would look ridiculous for a man to wear a woman's dress if he does not have the breasts to fill out the "large hollow bust areas". I barely fill out those areas in my dress without the use of breast forms.

You're inferring that you have and use breast forms. Is this true? To me, that's crossdressing, and last I checked, that wasn't what this site was all about. Someone in charge please correct me if I'm wrong and things here have changed.