gingham

English

a gingham tea towel/dishcloth

Etymology

From Malay genggang (“ajar; apart”), or a corruption of French Guingamp, the name of a town in Brittany, France, where this cloth may have been made.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡɪŋ.əm/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

gingham (countable and uncountable, plural ginghams)

1. (uncountable) A cotton fabric made from dyed and white yarn woven in checks.
   • 1913, Eleanor Gates, The Poor Little Rich Girl‎^[1]:

     And she found that she was not wearing a despised muslin frock! Her dress was gingham!—an adorable plaid with long sleeves, and a patch-pocket low down on the right side!

   • 1923, L[ucy] M[aud] Montgomery, “Chapter 8”, in Emily of New Moon, Toronto, Ont.: McClelland and Stewart, →OCLC:

     Aunt Elizabeth had produced a terrible gingham apron and an equally terrible gingham sunbonnet from somewhere in the New Moon garret, and made Emily put them on. The apron was a long sack-like garment, high in the neck, with sleeves.

   • 2022, Ling Ma, “G”, in Bliss Montage, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, →ISBN:

     Always, the relentless bass of hip-hop blasting in rooms of nautical-themed furnishings, faded driftwood, gingham upholstery, linen and chambray.

   • 2025 August 28, Gaby Hinsliff, “Taylor Swift: engaged, mummy-tracked and doomed to tradwifedom? You really haven’t been listening”, in The Guardian‎^[2], →ISSN:

     Tradwifedom, the meekly old-fashioned vision of domesticity served up on Instagram by a bunch of submissive influencers in aprons, is a gingham-lined trap visible from space […] .

2. (countable) A dress made from that material.
   • 1838 (date written), L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XIV, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], published 1842, →OCLC, page 187:

     "We have put on the pale blue silks that we wore at Isabella's wedding; that, however, was Georgiana's thought," continued Helen; "she said it would be impossible to go to church in our pink ginghams."

3. (UK, slang, archaic) An umbrella.
   • 1878, Gilbert Abbott À Beckett, George Cruikshank's Table-book, page 268:

     […] their ginghams stuck under their arms at right angles to their back-bones […]

Derived terms

• ginghamed

Translations

a cotton fabric made from dyed and white yarn woven in checks

• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 格子棉布 (gaak³ zi² min⁴ bou³)

  Mandarin: 格子棉布 (zh) (gézi miánbù)

• French: vichy (fr) m
• Georgian: კუბოკრული ქსოვილი (ḳuboḳruli ksovili)
• German: Gingan m
• Hiligaynon: ginggon
• Irish: guingeám m, guingeán m
• Japanese: ギンガム (gingamu)
• Korean: 깅엄 (ging'eom)
• Malagasy: gingana (mg)
• Malay: genggang, gingam
• Maranao: kanggan
• Portuguese: guingão m
• Spanish: guinga f

See also

• seersucker

Further reading

• gingham on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Category:gingham on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From English gingham.

Noun

gingham m (definite singular ginghamen, indefinite plural ginghamer, definite plural ginghamene)

1. (countable and uncountable) gingham

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From English gingham.

Noun

gingham m (definite singular ginghamen, indefinite plural ginghamar, definite plural ginghamane)

1. (countable and uncountable) gingham