English Idioms Involving Clothes
My students know how I love idioms. A.Word.A.Day. featured idioms involving clothes recently.
Fancy Pants
noun: Someone attractive, silly, or pretentious.
adjective: Snobbish; pretentious; newfangled; overly complicated.
Shirtsleeve
adjective:
1. Relating to pleasant warm weather.
2. Informal; direct.
3. Hardworking; having a can-do attitude.
Trouser role
noun:
In opera, drama, film, etc.:
1. A role in which a female character pretends to be a male.
2. A male part played by a female actor.
Also known as a breeches role or a pants role.
Brownshirt
noun: A member of police or military trained for carrying out a sudden assault, especially one marked by brutality and violence.
Seat-of-the-Pants
adjective:
1. Using experience, instinct, or guesswork as opposed to methodical planning.
2. Done without instruments.
To Keep One's Shirt on - refrain from losing one's temper
To Lose One's Shirt - to lose everything
To Wear the Pants in a Relationship - to be the dominant partner
To Catch Someone with Their Pants Down - to catch someone in an embarrasing situation
Do you know any other clothing related idioms?
7 comments:
I enjoy these too, they just make learning English confusing for the Japanese students though .
I often use 'take my hat off to xx' when I see some fantastic stitching on a blog
then there are: 'at the drop of a hat', tied to Mum's apron strings', 'under the belt', 'up one's sleeve', off the cuff, 'he's a slipper', 'blue stocking', white collar worker', 'with cap in hand'....
I'm not familiar with "shirtsleeve" as an adjective. Here it is used more in the form of "roll up your shirtsleeves", meaning get ready to do some hard work.
To "shirtfront" someone is an Australian expression which got an article on the BBC when a former Prime Minister used it:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-30173969
How funny ! THANKS, Pam :)
xoxo
Nadine
Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in four generations. Don't get your knickers in a knot.
I've got to think of more -- I know there are some!
Thanks for the smiles this morning.
xx, Carol
I knew most of these, but not all of them! I love learning something new.
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