couture

Ellipsis of haute couture, ultimately from French couture.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kuːˈtjʊə/, /kuːˈtʃʊə/

• (US) enPR: ko͞o-to͝orʹ, IPA^(key): /kuˈtʊɹ/
• Rhymes: -ʊə(ɹ)

couture (countable and uncountable, plural coutures)

1. (fashion) The production of high-end, custom-made clothing.
   • 2007, Cally Blackman, 100 Years of Fashion Illustration‎^[1], →ISBN, page 166:

     It was the branding of these products, rather than the couture itself, that would become the foundation of the industry, generating huge global sales by the last quarter of the century.

   • 2018 June 30, Vanessa Friedman, “Why We Cover High Fashion”, in The New York Times‎^[2], →ISSN:

     Anyway, there are only a few hundred clients in the world who regularly buy couture, including Middle Eastern royalty and American businesswomen.

• couturist
• couture house

• couturier
• couturial
• haute couture

Inherited from Old French costure, from Vulgar Latin *cōnsutūra, from Latin cōnsūtus, from cōnsuō.

• IPA^(key): /ku.tyʁ/

• Audio:

  (file)

couture f (plural coutures)

1. sewing
2. dressmaking
3. seam
4. (medical) stitches
5. scar

• bas couture
• battre à plate couture
• couturier
• haute couture

• coudre
• cousu

• English: couture

• “couture”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Unadapted borrowing from English couture (“production of high-end, custom-made clothing”), ellipsis of haute couture (“haute couture, high fashion”, literally “high, elegant + sewing”). Compare French couture (“sewing”).

couture (plural couture-couture)

1. (fashion) couture: production of high-end, custom-made clothing

• “couture” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016.