Meaning

A strip of pleated fabric or paper used as decoration or trim..

Definitions by Sense

1. A strip of pleated fabric or paper used as decoration or trim.
2. (figurative) A substance or material on the edge of something, resembling such a strip of fabric.
3. (photography) A wrinkled edge to a film.
4. (figurative) Something extraneous or not essential; something purely for show or effect; a luxury.
5. (zoology) The relatively extensive margin seen on the back of the heads of reptiles, with either a bony support or a cartilaginous one.
6. (mycology) Synonym of armilla.
7. (transitive) To make into a frill.
8. (intransitive) To become wrinkled.

Example Sentences

1777, Samuel Jackson Pratt (as Courtney Melmoth), Liberal Opinions, upon Animals, Man, and Providence, London: G. Robinson and J. Bew, Volume 5, Chapter 114, p. 163, […] one of her husband Jeffery’s shirts (with frills to the bosom) […]

His face had fallen in, and was unshorn; his frill and neckcloth hung limp under his bagging waistcoat.

Mind you, clothes were clothes in those days. […] Frills, ruffles, flounces, lace, complicated seams and gores: not only did they sweep the ground and have to be held up in one hand elegantly as you walked along, but they had little capes or coats or feather boas.

Nothing moved in sky, land, or sea, except a frill of milkwhite foam along the nearer angles of the shore, shreds of which licked the contiguous stones like tongues.

She had noticed yesterday that a few tiny corkscrew tendrils had come right through some cracks in the scullery ceiling and all the windows of the lean-to had a thick frill of ruffled green.

[T]he bright frills of the winter fungi on the blotched trunks of the trees;

‘Isn’t it a shame!’ Mrs Ayres said softly, now and then pausing to brush aside a frill of snow and examine the plant beneath […]

My name is Sammy Carleton. Not ‘Mr.’ Carleton, but just plain Sammy. I’m a regular no-nonsense man with no fancy frills about me. I want you to call me Sammy.

Word Forms

• frills
• frilling
• frilled

Synonyms for frill

Related Words

When Should You Use Frill?

Use frill when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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