austere

Adjective

austere (comparative austerer or more austere, superlative austerest or most austere)

1. Grim or severe in manner or appearance.
   • The headmistress was an austere old woman.
   • Even the austere philosopher Immanuel Kant of Koenigsberg, it is said, whose habits were so regular that the citizens of that town set their watches by him, postponed the hour of his afternoon stroll when he received the news [of the fall of the Bastille], thus convincing Koenigsberg that a...1962, Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution, page 61

   Synonyms:

   stern, strict, forbidding, ascetic, brutal, callous, cold, insensate, hardhanded, cold-eyed

2. Lacking decoration; trivial; not extravagant or gaudy.
   • The interior of the church was as austere as the parishioners were dour.
   • So we come, at above street level, into the city, and to Canterbury East Station (9.8 miles). It is an austere, rather barn-like structure, with a high roof over the two platforms.1958 October, Rev. A. W. V. Mace, “From Faversham to Dover—1”, in Railway Magazine, page 670

   Synonyms:

   simple, plain, unadorned, unembellished, bare, chaste, inornate, modest, quiet, severe

   Antonyms:

   overwrought, flamboyant, extravagant, gaudy, flashy, bedizened, blatant, blingish, brash, campy

3. Adhering to the economic policy of austerity.
   • Counterintuitively, in an effort to be austere and save money, cities which only remove a crossing every couple of years manage to be way less efficient at it than Melbourne has been.2024 December 14, Reece Martin, “Learning from Melbourne’s Level Crossing Removal Project” (9:05 from the start), in RMTransit
4. Harsh; astringent.
   • It is like a small plum, nearly globular in shape, black covered with a bluish bloom, and with a very austere taste.1862, Charles Pierpoint Johnson, The Useful Plants of Great Britain, page 85