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toile

 
Dictionary: toile   (twäl) pronunciation
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n.
A sheer fabric, such as linen or cotton.

[French. See toil2.]


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A photo of toile de jouy fabric on a french reproduction style chair.

Toile is a word that entered the English language around the 16th century[1] from a French word meaning "linen cloth" or "canvas" — particularly cloth or canvas for painting on. The word toile in modern English has multiple meanings.

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Test garment

A toile is a version of a garment made by a fashion designer or dressmaker to test a pattern. They are usually made in cheap material, as multiple toiles may be made in the process of perfecting a design. Toiles may be called "muslins" in the United States.

Toile de Jouy

Toile de Jouy, sometimes abbreviated to simply "toile", is a type of decorating pattern consisting of a usually white or off-white background on which a repeated pattern depicting a fairly complex scene, generally of a pastoral theme such as (for example) a couple having a picnic by a lake. Toiles also often consist of an arrangement of flowers. The pattern portion consists of a single colour, most often black, dark red, or blue. Greens, browns and magenta toile patterns are less common but not unheard of. Toile is most associated with fabrics (curtains and upholstery in particular), though toile wallpaper is also popular. Toile can also be used on teapots and beddings.

Toile de Jouy originated in France in the late 1700s. In the French language, the phrase literally means "cloth from Jouy-en-Josas", a town of north-central France. Although it has been continuously produced since then, it experienced a marked upsurge in popularity around the year 2000. Previously only a decorating design, designers have been recently experimenting with toile-patterned apparel as well, although toile-patterned shirts were widely worn in the 1970s.

Etymology

Middle English toile, from French toile ("cloth"), from Old French teile, from Latin tela, ("web"), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)teg ("to cover") (see List of Proto-Indo-European roots in Wiktionary).

References

  1. ^ Oxford English Dictionary. Toile, earliest citation from 1561. Also spelled toyl / toyle.

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Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Toile".  Read more