Word.ws English Dictionary

houndstooth

Syllables: hounds·toothUK/ˈhaʊndstuːθ/

houndstooth noun: a two-colour fabric pattern of broken checks.

Noun (1)

houndstooth (countable and uncountable, plural houndsteeth)

  1. A two-colour fabric pattern of broken checks.
    • Other patterns include varied adaptations of paisleys, Tree of Life motifs, tiles, scenics, patchworks, ticking, soft-edge geometries, sports themes, crewel shapes, houndsteeth, and a plethora of florals.1974, Interior Design, volume 45, New York, N.Y.: Interior Design Division of Whitney Communication Corp., →OCLC, page 251, column 1
    • A houndstooth fabric is composed of tiny, interlocking pinwheel motifs. There are many houndstooth knitting patterns[…]; to add an extra touch to these patterns, work them in nubby or textured yarns.1998, Deborah Newton, “Dressmaker Details & Finishing”, in Designing Knitwear, Newtown, Ct.: Taunton Press, →ISBN, page 210
  2. Fabric with a houndstooth pattern; an item of clothing made with such fabric.
    • Their ties were tidier, their houndsteeth toothier … they ended up looking more Windsorian than Windsor.1970, Men's Wear, volume 161, New York, N.Y.: Fairchild Publications, →OCLC, page 73, column 1
    • Her dress is wool too, brown and black houndsteeth that belonged to her mother.2014, Jacinda Townsend, “Jupiter”, in Saint Monkey: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: W. W. Norton & Company, →ISBN, page 68
  3. Hound's tongue, a plant of species Cynoglossum officinale

Noun (2) capitalized: Houndstooth

Houndstooth (plural Houndstooths)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of houndstooth.

Synonyms of houndstooth

Forms of houndstooth

pluralhoundsteeth
pluralHoundstooths

Origin of houndstooth

From hound + -s- + tooth, from its appearance. Although the pattern itself is archaeologically found from time immemorial, the modern term is first attested in 1936.

Questions about houndstooth

What does houndstooth mean?
Houndstooth means a two-colour fabric pattern of broken checks.
What part of speech is houndstooth?
Houndstooth is a noun.
How do you pronounce houndstooth?
Houndstooth is pronounced /ˈhaʊndstuːθ/ (UK).
What is the plural of houndstooth?
The plural of houndstooth is houndsteeth.

Words near houndstooth in the dictionary

  1. houndsman
  2. houndsmen
  3. houndsteeth
  4. houndstongue
  5. houndstongues
  6. houndstooth
  7. Houndwood
  8. houndy
  9. hounfour
  10. hounfours
  11. houngan

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: houndstooth (page history and authors); Houndstooth (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: en-au-houndstooth.ogg.

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