Liberating Tweed From Granny's Clutches

O.K., it feels like an Uncle Ben's Rice Bowl outside, the spring collections are around the corner and demonstrators are calling the president of the United States really bad names. So it's not a good moment to think about tweed.

But soon you will be able to express your inner self, small and superficial though it may be, by showing you know what's hot. Tweed coats, tweed suits, tweed pencil skirts, even tweed knickers -- there is a danger of looking slightly twee if you don't treat the season's most pervasive look with the indifference that fashion generally demands.

What is striking, in fact, about the fall collections is how even the most classic tweed variations -- notably Ralph Lauren's rustic herringbone blazers and pencil suits -- do not sink into nostalgia or mumsy artiface, a problem for young designers with pictures of C. Z. Guest on their walls. Why look back with envy? Mr. Lauren's jackets are cut close to the body; curves matter. And with the higher armholes, you will look as lean and sharp as a glamorous letter opener.

In the minimalist 1990's, tweeds were conspicuously absent from fashion; the texture, the jaunty flash of color and Lurex sparkle somehow did not jibe with heroin chic and equally anemic-looking slip dresses. And there weren't the kind of technical innovations with tweed that Karl Lagerfeld displayed two years ago at Chanel with haute couture suits that appeared to be disintegrating at the hems (and were, in reality, an expensive Lesage embroidery trick).

Maybe that was the beginning. Maybe Mr. Lagerfeld's attempt to create the illusion of organic synthesis with humble old tweed led to a reappraisal and ultimately a fashion consensus. Christian Lacroix's herringbone tweed prints at Pucci, Junya Watanabe's puffy ponchos and Oscar de la Renta's haute black and white shift with feathery fringe -- just about everybody seemed in cahoots. And at all price ranges. With labels like Jill Stuart and Vince offering great-fitting pencil skirts and jackets (and Ann Taylor making an aggressive pitch for tweed in its new advertisements), there is no reason to spend a bundle to get the look.

And, of course, the fabric lends itself to this season's more dressed-up looks and, at the other extreme latex fetisch, those mannish waistcoats, wide-leg trousers and schoolboy scarves. But the real factor is that postmodern designers like Miuccia Prada and Marc Jacobs are constantly blending styles and periods -- and textures like fitch fur and tartan or patches of beadwork on masculine-looking houndstooth.

When you take anything out of its traditional context, subvert it a little, you start to see it differently. Ms. Prada showed some of her chaste-looking coats with bare legs and velvet slides, as if the potential customer for this outfit never planned to meet a puddle. But the idea is just another expression of casual dressing.

One way to wear Mr. Jacobs's severe gray tweed coat for Louis Vuitton, with its Imperial-looking brocade hem, is with Prada's slim cropped pants, Dries van Noten's shirred black organza top and a pair of teal suede stilettos. Libertine's tweeds look as if they have been endlessly washed.

You have to break out of form with tweed, as Dolce & Gabbana did with a terrific cocktail dress with a black speckled tweed bodice and a slim lace skirt. (Or Mr. Lauren did when he used turquoise jewelry.)

Some of the best tweed looks happened to be for evening -- not a ball gown, perhaps. But a sturdy tweed coat with a skimmy organza shift or a creamy tulle skirt (with a jolt of pink on the legs) certainly isn't mommy wear.