Word.ws English Dictionary

clotheshorse

clotheshorse noun: a frame on which laundry is hung to dry.

clotheshorse: a frame on which laundry is hung to dry
Image: Trollderella, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

clotheshorse (plural clotheshorses)

  1. A frame on which laundry is hung to dry.
    • In front of the darkened electric fire stood a wooden clothes horse draped with tights and underwear.2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 279
  2. (derogatory, figuratively, slang) A person excessively concerned with the appearance of their clothing.
    • Her mother was a genuine clotheshorse. She had had more kimonos and dresses than room in their chests to store them […]1997, Haruki Murakami, translated by Jay Rubin, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.; republished New York: Vintage Books, 1998, →ISBN, page 471

Synonyms of clotheshorse

Forms of clotheshorse

pluralclotheshorses
alternative formclothes-horse
alternative formclothes horse

Origin of clotheshorse

From clothes + horse.

Questions about clotheshorse

What does clotheshorse mean?
Clotheshorse means a frame on which laundry is hung to dry.
What part of speech is clotheshorse?
Clotheshorse is a noun.
What is the plural of clotheshorse?
The plural of clotheshorse is clotheshorses.

Words near clotheshorse in the dictionary

  1. clothesbaskets
  2. clothesbrush
  3. clothesbrushes
  4. clothescare
  5. clotheses
  6. clotheshorse
  7. clotheshorses
  8. clothesies
  9. clothesless
  10. clotheslessness
  11. clothesline

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: clotheshorse (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-clotheshorse.wav.

Cite this entry: “clotheshorse.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/clotheshorse. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.