Word of the Day

: May 17, 2014

sartorial

adjective sahr-TOR-ee-ul

What It Means

: of or relating to a tailor or tailored clothes; broadly : of or relating to clothes

sartorial in Context

Since Daniel was well-known for his impeccable sartorial taste, I asked him for help in upgrading my own wardrobe.

"Her truck, specializing in clothes for plus-size women, is one of the mobile fashion retailers-the sartorial cousins to food trucks-that have taken to Washington area streets over the past year and a half." - From an article by Stephanie Merry in The Washington Post, April 16, 2014

Did You Know?

It's easy to uncover the root of "sartorial." Just strip off the suffix "-ial" and you discover the Latin noun "sartor," meaning "tailor" (literally, "one who patches or mends"). Sartorial splendor has been the stuff of voguish magazines for years, and even "sartor" itself has occasionally proven fashionable, as it did in 1843, when Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote of "coats whose memory turns the sartor pale," or in the 1870 title The Sartor, or British journal of cutting, clothing, and fashion. "Sartorial" has been in style with English speakers since at least 1823.