BARE's Guide on What to Wear in the Show Ring

Every time you step into the ring you want to look and feel your best. Show ring attire is all about effortless elegance and choosing a look to compliment you, your horse and be in the correct attire for the class.

We've pulled together our top tips on attire colour choices for the show ring so you can get your look on point.

Class Type

Your outfit choice will depend on the class you are competing in. We explain the differences in requirements and what styles you can mix and match for each below:

Hunter Classes

Hunter classes require a more traditional dress, wearing tweed wool blend jackets in browns, greens, mustards and blues. Traditional tights colours for these types of classes are beige tones like our Hunter, Gold or Stone, although some riders choose to wear Vanilla Creme too.

When choosing a tights and jacket combination for Hunter classes we suggest matching Navy and Green Tweed with Stone or Vanilla Creme tights. Brown and Mustard jackets pair well with Hunter, Stone or Vanilla Creme.

Open Classes

If you are riding in an open class jackets are required to be a solid colour; Navy, Black or Brown.

We recommend wearing a Navy jacket with Lemon Butter, Stone or Vanilla Creme tights. Black and Brown Jackets look best with Stone or Vanilla.

Gloves

You can wear Black, Navy or Brown gloves for any class. These can be leather (or leather-look), mesh or crocheted. 

Black gloves pair best with a black jacket or hunter tweed jacket with black trims, navy gloves best with navy jackets or tweed with navy trims and brown and brown tones are recommended for most Hunter classes.

What Not to Wear

It is not advisable to wear white competition tights or white gloves for any classes in the show ring. 

Horse Colour

Taking the above into consideration, you also need to choose colours that compliment your horse. When deciding on your show ring look, it is best to start with a jacket that is correct for your class type and matches your horse.

Brown and beige jacket tones look beautiful on a bright bay or chestnut, while green and navy work well for most coloured horses. 

You can choose a plaid that will flatter your horses colour: yellow and red highlights in your plaid look pleasing with a buckskin or palomino, while light blues and navy would suit a grey (and most other colours too!). 

All BARE Competition Tights look good with most horse colours although we would not recommend choosing to wear Gold or Lemon Butter on a grey horse.

You can get started by looking at our Competition Tights range HERE and find a colour that suits your look.

We hope this helps you choose your next show winning attire for the ring.