Tweed has been an important element of clothing, which has crossed and challenged gender boundaries between the late nineteenth century and the present. This paper explores the shifting meanings of women’s garments in tweed of the inter-war period. The new styles of sportswear for females, which developed from the 1920s were linked to the challenging of social and sartorial etiquette codes, particularly those linked to gender. Tweeds, often combined with knitwear, were a key element of these modern fashions. The paper will explore to what extent these new styles symbolized, rather than reflected, actual changes in the social position of women in the inter-war period.