Donegal tweed manufactured for centuries it took on its modern form in the 1880s, largely due to the pioneering work of English philanthropist Alice Rowland Hart. While the weavers in County Donegal produce a number of different tweed fabrics, including herringbone and check patterns, the area is best known for a plain-weave cloth of differently-coloured warp and weft, with small pieces of yarn in various colours woven in at irregular intervals to produce a heathered effect. Such fabric is often labelled as "donegal" (with a lowercase "d") regardless of its provenance. Along with Harris Tweed manufactured in the Scottish Highlands, Donegal is
Isle of Lewis carried out in the Scottish Gaelic language. Almost all of the Gaelic speakers are bilingual. Most of the place names in Lewis and Harris come from Old Norse. The name "Lewis" is the English spelling of the Scottish Gaelic "Leòdhas" which comes from the Old Norse "Ljóðhús", as Lewis is named in medieval Norwegian maps of the island. Various suggestions have been made as to a Norse meaning such as "song house". The name is not of Gaelic origin, the Norse credentials are questionable and it may have a pre-Celtic root. As well as regularly playing host to the Royal