Tweed

Tweed is durable stuff, woven out of pure wool in Scotland (and Donegal). It was originally coloured with vegetable dyes, and it is still known for its subtle, muted shades. How could you not love it? And with eco being in fashion, how could it not be cool? And it could be about to make a comeback. Read all about it at Fast Company.

Somehow it has become code for conventional, middle class and stuffy. Fashion writers can't mention it without dragging in Miss Marple. Ladies of her vintage would get a tweed "coat and skirt" (she'd never call it a suit or costume) tailor made, and wear it for the next 20 years.

Although he is a young, good looking man, his bearded, tweedy appearance tells the world he feels unloved, and doesn't see the point in loving himself. Web iofilm.co.uk

They don't look like soldiers, these stolid and slightly tweedy Keiths, Brians and Nicks of the Met Office staff. (How can you be “slightly tweedy”? Just wear a tweed hat?)

Stuart didn't listen to The Killers: "I always knew they were overrated and now they turn up on David Cameron's tweedy iPod playlist to prove the point." Guardian, January 9, 2006

Its details will be remembered by him, and by tweedy historians, and by no one else. Guardian, November 3, 2005

Luddites will twitch uneasily in their tweed trousers. Guardian, March 12, 2006

Most people in the media were tired of aristocratic old men in tweed jackets. March 12, 2006

A tourist board England of guardsmen and tweedy butlers. Times, July 20 2006 (Butlers wear black coats and pinstriped trousers.)

Stodgy, tweedy Vaughan Williams – who could get into that? amazon.ca

From an era when most British architecture was too tweedy and austere for comfort. Guardian, May 30, 2007

I’ve spoken at more literary festivals in more charmingly tweedy English market towns than feature in Arthur Mee’s King’s England. Simon Montefiore, ES mag, July 6, 2007

Tolkein knew how to put the twee into tweedy. Observer, June 24, 2007

Although he is a young, good looking man, his bearded, tweedy appearance tells the world he feels unloved, and doesn't see the point in loving himself... iofilm.co.uk

A website focused on the overdevelopment and "tweeding" of the borough of Queens in the City of New York

Ian adjusts his frameless specs – His overall demeanour's tweedy. Guardian arts blog commenter on Ian McEwan, January 2008

The C30, a compact two-door hatchback, rips a sizeable hole in Volvo’s careful, tweedy image. (crash.net)

So, despite the almost tweedy image she has fostered, I have to confess, Ruth Kelly exudes youth and energy. atl.org.uk (That's not "almost tweed" she's wearing, it is tweed.)