Keeping Up Appearances: Out Of Whole Cloth: Material Words

Calico refers to a simple, inexpensive woven cotton that's heavier than muslin but lighter than canvas. Often brightly printed, calico has thus given its name to any cat with a patchwork appearance.

Canvas is a heavy cotton cloth used for everything from sails, to work clothes, to the floor of boxing rings. Artists often stretch it over a frame and paint on it, so a painting can be referred to as a canvas.

Kashmir, the contested mountainous region between India and Pakistan, gave its name to a great Led Zeppelin song, and, more appropriately for this list, to a particular kind of goat native to that region. The hair from the Kashmir goat is incredibly soft — much softer than sheep's wool — and is used to make cashmere, which is fabricated into luxury knitwear of all sorts, even sweatpants!

Chenille is the French word for caterpillar (the cute, fuzzy kind). They wear little berets and everything!

Chiffon is a fabric so silky and weightless that it gave its name to a dessert: a chiffon pie uses gelatin and beaten egg whites to achieve a light, fluffy texture.

Like crepe paper, the material of the same name is thin and crinkly. There is also another clothing-related crepe: the bumpy tan latex used for the soles of casual shoes like Clark's desert boots.

Originally a Hindi term for denim, a heavy cotton fabric often dyed blue with indigo, dungaree quickly became synonymous with jeans and overalls, the clothing most often made from that fabric.

When wool is still attached to the sheep that grew it, it's called fleece. To fleece someone means to cheat them, as in shearing off all their wool and leaving them naked in a field. Synthetic fleece, made from polyester, is a hugely popular material for fuzzy vests and outdoorsy jackets, but it does shed plastic particles into the environment.

Named for the British island, jersey is the material T-shirts are made from. Some shirts, especially athletic team uniforms, are given the name jersey. Jersey cows are also named for the island, but T-shirts are not made from the cows. Cows don't wear jerseys either, unless they're Chicago Bulls.

Lightweight and airy, linen is a great choice for summer clothes. Like canvas, painters sometimes stretch it and paint on it. It's more expensive, but because of its finer surface artists who can afford linen tend to prefer it.

Piqué (often spelled with the accent) is a tight cotton fabric often used to make polo shirts. Pique can also mean "stimulate" or "inspire" as in something interesting piques your curiosity. "A fit of pique" is a temper tantrum. It is therefore possible to have a pique polo shirt pique your interest and then you yell at the mannequin in a fit of pique when you see the price tag.

Silk, an elegant and expensive material famous for its strength and shine, is made by unrolling the cocoons of a caterpillar — bombyx mori — better known as a silkworm.

Soft and luxurious, velvet is a cloth that evokes elegance. Velour is a cheaper cotton or synthetic version of velvet — think track suit as opposed to dinner jacket. As with canvas and linen, some artists paint on black velvet, but their subjects tend to be portraits of Elvis or dogs playing poker.