NEW ARRIVALS to Dublin airport used to be greeted by a large advertisement on behalf of the IDA. An assortment of smartly-suited, fresh-faced men and women beamed out at the observer beneath a sign proclaiming "We Are The Young Europeans". This is probably our favourite image of contemporary Irish style: youthful, vibrant, cosmopolitan. It suggests that we can hold our own with any other nation and that Ireland is no different from its partners in Europe.

But that's not how those same partners see us. A more accurate reflection of Irish style as it is seen abroad was provided last January at the menswear collections in Paris, where Christian Dior presented a show called Une Ballade Irlandaise. The Dior designer, Patrick Lavoix, has never visited this country, but clearly did not regard lack of first-hand knowledge as a handicap. Still, his interpretation of Ireland was a world away from that of the IDA, involving layers of vibrant, coloured and patterned tweeds and a fondness for cloaks and dashing hats. A rhapsodical text accompanied Lavoix's clothes, replete with lyrical references to unspoilt countryside and a simple rural existence that the French have held dear since the time of Rousseau.

"A beautiful vision of Ireland, but a limiting one," is how Godfrey Deeny describes this view. Deeny, who works for Conde Nast in Paris, says that the French still see Ireland as being embodied by the 1977 film Le Taxi Mauve; "an eccentrically elegiac vision featuring Charlotte Rampling and Fred Astaire, but really starring the country houses, tweed suits, fishing gear and the romantic terrain of the west".

It is extraordinary how pervasive such a vision of this country and its style still is. "Ireland represents for me a country of wonders and I feel strangely close to it," says French designer Christian Lacroix, another man who has strong opinions on us without ever having travelled here. He suggests his warm regard for Ireland "is really due to a most rigorous, but very warm and authentic tradition consisting of fine workmanship, popular arts and an informal elegance which is stronger than any fashion

Godfrey Deeny, who used to work in Milan, thinks that the Italians have "a far more urban view of Ireland, a funky brew composed of U2 and The Cranberries, cinema a la The Commitments and edgy images like Perry Ogden's photos of young Dublin kids and their horses". However, this opinion is subverted by the words of Italian designer Gianfranco Ferre. "I have unfortunately no direct experience of Ireland, having never had occasion to visit the country, says Ferre. "Nevertheless, Ireland exerts a charm on me too. It's the powerful and irresistible allure of a nation with a soul of its own."

Despite his lack of first-hand experience, he thinks there is such a thing as Irish style, one which is "balanced among the naturalness, solidness and poetry always there in Irish eyes".

Poetry and purity are two words which consistently turn up whenever the subject of Irish style is raised - particularly when the speaker has only indirect experience of the country. New York designer Donna Karan refers to "the purity of Irish lifestyle, the natural splendour of the country where everything is unspoilt and there is an untouched naturalness". For her, Ireland means "big wonderful sweaters and natural materials like Donegal wools and tweeds. It's a classic timelessness untouched by trends."

Even those who have an intimate knowledge of Ireland seem unable to resist lyricism. "I love Ireland," proclaims Joan Juliet Buck, editor-in-chief of French Vogue. Having spent her childhood in Co Galway, her images of Irish style are more specific but no less romantic. "My mother just died," she explains, "and the things of hers I kept include two Irish sweaters for the smell of the wool." She also remembers buying "flannel striped collarless men's shirts (old) and we had bainin skirts made - no velvet stripes as we were young and unmarried!"

Both Joan Juliet Buck and Italian Vogue's Allegra Donn, who also spent part of her childhood here, particularly recall the linen and tweed dresses of Donald Davies. "There's also an important jumper culture,"

argues Donn, a culture of "people wrapped up in warm, cuddly, thick woollen jumpers for me, Irish style consists of a `freshness', a straightforwardness. It lies in laughing green eyes and pale complexions; it is a beauty from within that is not self-conscious."

ASSEMBLING these impressions of the country and its style, the idea forms that Ireland - or at least the popular image of Ireland abroad - answers a powerful need for somewhere to embody unspoilt naturalness in a rapidly changing environment. "Ireland seems to remain unchanged by the extreme materialism that has plagued the rest of Europe," according to Allegra Donn.

"Ireland is the soul of Europe," claims Joan Juliet Buck, while New York fashion doyenne Eleanor Lambert says this country "remains uniquely different in its `take' on life and every art form". A regular visitor to Ireland, she says "my timeless image of Irish fashion is the magic mix of folkloric Celtic charm and aristocratic style I first saw in the clothes of Sybil Connolly when, in 1952, she introduced Irish fashion to the contemporary scene in America."

To those who live here the idea of a timeless Celtic spirit informing Irish style may seem bizarre. However, even Slim Barrett, the London-based jewellery designer who was born in Galway, becomes infected by this spirit when he comments "the unique blend of the Catholic faith and Celtic tradition upon the contemporary life of an island people has created a very distinctive Irish style". Few outside observers appear to have any awareness of the very considerable changes which have taken place here in the past few decades; and the Irish designers we see as enjoying an international reputation are not mentioned. Canadian shoe designer Patrick Cox uniquely refers to contemporary Irish style when he exclaims "John Rocha is great".

The style images which recur again and again for Ireland are entirely traditional: tweed, linen and wool sweaters set against a rugged landscape. Modern urban Ireland scarcely seems to exist; instead, the country is seen as being locked in a stylistic timewarp where everyone still wears clothes in natural fabrics, manufactured by antiquated methods. This may be an archaic perspective - if indeed, it was ever really true - but one that retains authority. The IDA may like to classify us as Young Europeans, but to the rest of the world, apparently, we represent old, unspoilt Europe.