brocade

Definition

A thick heavy fabric into which raised patterns have been woven, originally in gold and silver; more recently any cloth incorporating raised, woven patterns.

Etymology

From Occitan brocada and Spanish and Portuguese brocado, influenced by French brocart, from Italian broccato, from brocco, ultimately from Gaulish.

Example Sentences

• "Madame Legarde, the "glass of fashion and the nurse of form," (alias the most fashionable of milliners,) has comfortably assured me, "that my figure has great merit, and only requires cultivation:" this is to be done by tissues, brocades, and laces, which are now scattered round me in charming confusion."
• "… his desire to stand in brocade and sing Rhadames in Aida was like my eagerness to go far, far beyond fellow intellectuals of my generation who had lost the imaginative soul."
• "I selected a pair of loose, dark trousers bound at the waist with a russet sash, a tunic with an open neck and large pockets, and a cloak of the true fuligin of that guild of which I am still officially a master, lined with particolored brocade."