Karate Gi Colors

[Sailor Sindbad]

When doing some dojo shopping in the area, I've seen a few dojos that allow you to wear whatever color you want. I know of a hapkido dojang (I personally have no interest in hapkido, by the way) that has various colors and combinations of colors of dobok, but everyone is required to a wear a specific color or color combination depending on rank and day of the week. This is the way I'd want it to be in a karate dojo, if it had different colored gis. To me, students in a dojo wearing "whatever they want" gives the appearance of being disorganized - which affects my perception of the martial arts training itself.

I don't get that same impression with BJJ, since the allowance of individualism with BJJ gis is known the world over as being an integral part of BJJ culture.

Both at the Shorin-ryu dojo that I've moved on from and at the Shotokan dojo that I now train at, it's fully white gis for everyone.

I'm not a fan of fully black gis but, if it were an option for me, I wouldn't mind mixing the colors (i.e., top black, bottom white; or vice versa). All other colors, be they red, blue, whatever - to me, only look good if mixed with black or white. I'm only speaking of karate gis, not judo or BJJ.