a coarse wool cloth in a variety of weaves and colors, either hand-spun and handwoven in Scotland or reproduced, often by machine, elsewhere.
tweeds, garments made of this cloth.
a paper having a rough surface, used especially for certain photographic prints.
William Marcy Boss Tweed, 1823–78, U.S. politician.
a river flowing E from S Scotland along part of the NE boundary of England into the North Sea. 97 miles (156 km) long.
a male given name.
a thick woollen often knobbly cloth produced originally in Scotland
( as modifier )
a tweed coat
(plural) clothes made of this cloth, esp a man's or woman's suit
informal (plural) trousers
1835–45; apparently back formation from Scots tweedling twilling (now obsolete) < ?
Tweed is a kind of speckled fabric made from woven wool. Used for jackets, suits, and coats, tweed is a rough, sturdy material. Tweed was originally tweel, the Scots word for twill, a diagonally-patterned textile weave. In the 1830's the word was misread by a fabric merchant who assumed it came from the Scottish River Tweed, and the name stuck. Woven on looms, rough wool is transformed into tweed's tidy patterns, like herringbone and houndstooth. Most tweed is still made in Scotland for garments including suit jackets, skirts, and trousers, as well as blankets and scarves.
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As Champagne must come from its designated region in France, Harris tweed can only be made in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides islands.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 1, 2026
They are waulking the wool, an age-old tradition for rendering tweed soft and airtight so that it might keep the shepherds of the Scottish Hebrides warm.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 17, 2026
Variety described it as "dutiful fan service, sure to satisfy legions of cultists cosplaying in tweed, but not unapproachable to viewers who aren't entirely au fait with the show".
From BBC • Mar. 5, 2026
Costelloe often used traditional Irish fabrics and textiles in his designs, including Irish linen and tweed.
From BBC • Nov. 22, 2025
We’ve been together since third grade, when we both showed up for the school Halloween parade wearing the Eleventh Doctor’s tweed jacket and red fez hat.
From "A Place at the Table" by Saadia Faruqi and Laura Shovan
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
